
Wie last, fiiMtnt, and 4ittiirf of Jimcrira 




AN ORATION 



DELIVERED IN THE 



FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 



ORAXGE, NEW JERSEY, 



jrXJJL.^^ 4tli, 186i 



BY 



PROF. HENRY W. ADAMS, M.A.,M.D. 



OF IRVINGTON, X. J. 




NEW YORK : 
FEINTED BY JOHN F. TROW & CO., 50 GREENE STREET 

1865. 





Class. 
Book. 






1^ 



J 



THE PAST, PRESEXT, AND FUTURE OF AMERICA. 



AN ORATION 



DEHVEKED IN THE 



FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 



ORANGE, NEW JERSEY, 



JXJJL.^^ 4tli, 180S. 



BY 



PROF. HENRY W. ADAMS, M.A.,M.D., 

OF IRVINGTON, N. J. 




NEW YORK: 

PRINTED BY JOHN F. TROW & CO., 50 GREENE STREET. 

1865. 



Oeange, July 18, 1865. 
Peof. 11. W. Adams: 

Dear Sir : — There li.iving been expressed, on tlie part of tlie citizens of 
Orange, a very general desire to read and jireserve the valuable Oration, to a 
portion of which it was their happy fortune to listen on tlie 4th of July last, 
the undersigned have been instructed by the *' General Cummittee of Arrange- 
ments for the celebration of the 4th of July," to solicit from yon a copy for 
publication; the proceeds of tlie sale of which shall be appropriated to the 
erection, in Or;inge, of a monument to all its citizens who have fallen in the 
great battle of Freedom. Very respectfully yours, 

T. BALDWllSr, Jk., Sec'y. 

ROAVLAND JOIINSOK 

Irvington, Essex Co., N. J., July 19, 1865. 
Messrs. T. Baldwi^j, Sec. of General Committee of Arrangements, and Row- 
land Johnson : 

Gentlemen : — Your communication has been this day received, soliciting 
a copy of my Oration, delivered at Orange ou the 4th of July last, for pub- 
lication. 

If the popular judgment of j'our patriotic and scholarly town be so much 
in its favor as to justify you in the belief that funds can be raised by its sale 
to erect a monumental column to commemorate the patriotism and valor of 
your heroes, struck down in defense of our dear America, then, gentlemen, 
freely accept it, and use it for that sacred purpose. 

Let the spirit of freedom that burst in the star 

Wiiich the Pilgrims beheld in the west, 
Still kindle the fire of your liberty higher. 

And thrill every patriot's breast. 
Let it burn in the cry of the millions enslaved, 

Which peals from the uttermost shore ; 
O, Bethlehem star, that is shining afar, 

The day of man's bondage is o'er. 

Rejoice that our fathers, whose patriot- veins 

For freedom their crimson outpoured, 
Now shout o'er the land, where their monuments stand : 

Our charter to man is restored. 
Respond to the voices that sound in the air. 

And echo from mountain to sea: 
O, Bethlehem star, that is shining afar, 

AYe struck for the land to be fiee. > 



Oppression and madness enkindled the brand ; 

No iL-af of the olive remains; 
Free labor and soil, free wages for toil, 

Have broken four millions of chains. 
Unseen were the horsemen and chariots of fire, 

That shouted and fought in the van : 
O, Bethlehem star, that is shining afar, 

"We strike for the freedom of man. 

Bring wreaths for the heroes that limp from the field, 

With the flag and the Union restored ; 
And rear o'er their bones a proud column of stones, 

In honor of martyrs deplored : 
For brave Avas the spirit that burst in the cry, 

Of brothers all gory and low : 
0, Bethlehem star, that is shining afar, 

"VVe fall with our breasts to the foe. 

IIow sweet is the spirit that breathes from tlie skies! 

lIo-3" pensively tender and bland ! 
'Tis the fragrance of bloom that perfmneth the tomb, 

And the dew that lies fresh in the land. 
'Tis freedom's libation poured out for the race. 

As the I'ansom that Liberty pays. 
O, Bethlehem star, that is shining afar, 

Our Lincoln enkindles thy rays. 

Ye sons of Columbia, grand is our day, 

For Union and Freedom we've bled ; 
The hopes of mankind in our cause were enshrined, 

From bondage and chains to be led. 
Our records of valor will never decay, 

The ages new glory will find ; 
O, Bethlehem star, that is shining afar. 

We've struck for the good of mankind. 

Ye watchmen of Freedom, say : What of the night ? 

That's hung on the earth like a pall ? 
The sleepers are waking, the morning is breaking. 

And Liberty's coming for all. 
The pillar of fire is aglow in the air. 

Invisible legions control; 
0, Bethlehem star, that is shining afar. 

We've struck for tiie freedom of soul. 

Very respectfully, your most obedient servant, 

HENRY W. ADAMS. 



Ladies and Gentlemek : 

All bail to the birtli-day of American Independence! a day 
on which the linger of God pointed out a glorious Republic to 
the sons of Columbia, and liberty, religion, and progress started 
on the wing. 

The history of events is the judgment of God; from which 
it is manifest that he ordained this continent to be the theater 
of free institutions and a refined civilization. 

How complete were the divine preparations for the advent 
of a stupendous nation, gifted with intelh'gence, skill, and power 
of accomplishment, to occupy its bomidless domain, and utilize 
its vast resources ! 

The fertility of the soil, the salubi-ity of the climate, the 
inland seas and navigable rivers, with the abundance of timber, 
metals, coal and oil stored away in the surface of the earth's 
crust, for the uses, comforts and artistic adornings of civilized 
life, clearly indicated the approach of a people mentally, 
morally, and physically qualilied to a2:>propriate provisions so 
varied and muniiicent. 

Everything betokened the fullest freedom. The air was 
electrical with the spirit of liberty, the beasts roamed in wild 
unrest, the rivers were bold, the Aborigines were free and fleet, 
and the brawny mountains stood np and preached liberty to the 
valleys and prairies, the cradles of unborn millions, whilst the 
omnipresent forests nodded assent, the roaring winds wafted the 
free gospel from shore to shore, and the loud thunder of two 
oceans responded : Hallelujah ! 

In due time, God, who never hurries his work, but causes 
broad harvests to grow from seeds, and boundless forests to 
burst from shells, had "a peculiar people " prepared in the cru- 
cible of tribulation and persecution to transplant to the new 
soil. The Mayflower bloomed out in December, the type of a 
hardy and perennial growth, and the pilgrims planted their 
strange feet on the sullen rocks of New England, and their 



sturdy institutions on the lirmer rocks of tlieir principles. But 
the wilds, the savages, and the ferocions beasts were not to 
abscond from their ancient homes to make room for a nation of 
serfs and slaves. 

An indomitable spirit, a stern morality, an ansterc religion, 
an obstinate pluck, and a stiff-necked freedom had come to cap- 
ture a Xew World from the wilderness, to wrestle with sullen 
destiny, and work out the secret pur}:)Oses of God. The inven- 
tion of printing, the discovery of America, the Protestant Ref- 
ormation, and the decline of feudalism before the day -gush of a 
brighter civilization, had extinguished the ancient slavery, and 
modern serfdom had been driven across the frontiers of frost- 
bitten Russia. The condition of the white masses had been 
somewhat ameliorated, but African slavery had been revived by 
Moorish, Spanish and Portuguese traders. Columbus had 
stained his immortal name by the capture and enslavement of 
large numbers of the American Aborigines, whom he kidnapped 
and carried away to Spain. Others equally reckless and avari- 
cious followed his shameless example. The whole western 
coast of Africa was thrown open to the nefarious traffic in 
human flesh. The infamous trade was so lucrative that all 
classes, from the peasant to the king, including the learned and 
the rich, patronized its horrors, and greedily fattened on its 
gains. Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, and English merchants, lost 
to all humanity, sought new markets for their human cargoes in 
the American colonies. Spanish and Portuguese America, with 
Dutch and French Guinea and the "West India Islands, were 
rapidly overspread with negro slaveiy. In 1607, a permanent 
English colony was planted in Yirginia. Thirteen years after 
the first cargo of slaves was landed at Jamestown. The institu- 
tion of slavery had become respectable from a century's growth 
in Spanish and Portuguese America. The Virginia colonists 
were chiefly mere soldiers of fortune, bankrupts, prodigals, 
spendthrifts, and criminals, allured thither by the hopes of mend- 
ing their shattered fortunes in the New World. The soil was 
fertile, and the crops abundant, and profitable. Manual labor 
was scarce and the demand for slaves great. The colony was 
patronized by the aristocracy of London and the smiles of the 
court. Under these aus})icos, slavery became an established 
institution in Virginia. Other Southern colonies imitated her 
example. All this was before the pilgrims landed on Plymouth 



rock. As slavery was a source of wealth, public opiiuon justi- 
fied it in England. To sustain the system in her American 
settlements, the legal erudition and acumen of English lawyers 
and judges were enlisted by heavy bribes of slave traders and 
capitalists in London, to justify and legalize the system in the 
mother country. The English courts held that slaves being 
bought and sold, and also being infidels^ were property suffi- 
ciently to maintain trover. The nature and sanctity of human 
rights were vaguely understood. The head of Algernon Sidney 
had not yet rolled from the block, nor the battle field been 
reddened by the gore of John Hampden. The pilgrim pioneers, 
believing in the covenanted mercies of God, and being often 
overmatched by the ferocity and treachery of the Indians, held 
all savages, whetlicr red men or black, to be the children of 
Satan and the enemies of religion. Under this stern impression, 
they tolerated to some extent, both Indian and IS^egro slavery. 
But the bleak climate and rocky topography of New England 
were much less favorable to slavery than the Southern coasts, 
whose Sea Islands abounded in indigo and rice. Led on by a 
greed for gold, a more unscrupulous class of English emigrants 
composed the Southern colonies. Like most of the early pio- 
neers who rush to a new country to make their fortunes, they 
lacked principle and sought only wealth. They cared not what 
institutions they gave to the land, provided only they could 
accumulate riches. Thus gold-loving England, with neither 
conscience nor humanity, established slavery in this country, 
two hundred and fifty years ago, and history holds her guilty of 
the procuring cause of our terrible war. 

But profound religious convictions united the pilgrims and 
ruled their heroic conduct. They had come to a ISTew AVorld 
to make it their permanent abode. Their'i'eligion was pregnant 
with polar antagonisms, both against the uncircumcised hosts 
and a robed ecclesiasticism. As they sought a cpiiet, religious 
home, with liberty to worship Gcd a(tcording to the dictates of 
their own consciences, more than gold, the solitudes and seclu- 
sion of New England had for them peculiar charms. Conse- 
quently, united by a common bond of faith, and with fewer 
slaves, they were content to wring chiefly by their own hands a 
scanty subsistence from a more unwilling soil. This was provi- 
dential. For instead of slavery, aristocracy, and wealth, they 
were to crystallize great principles, and raise up men and women 



to lay broad and deep t])e foundations of civil and roliffious 
liberty, figlit the battle of Independence, crnsh out ultimately 
human slavery, strangle treason against the right of free govern- 
ment, and establish American nationality over the whole 
continent. 

Hence with the butt-end of their religion, which was stub 
born independence and endless damnation to savages and infi- 
dels, they smote the forests, the w^ld beasts, and the Indians, 
and with the sharp end, pricked the grace of God into their 
children. By rigorous discipline and culture they produced in 
their physical, moral, and religious constitutions a sturdy spinal 
column, which straightened them up into a broad and square- 
shouldered manhood. They put a new leaven into An\erican 
civilization which is destined to work on until the whole lump is 
leavened. 

With the axe or hoe in one hand, and the musket in the 
other, they worshiped God in solemn awe, and succeeded in 
keeping the wolf and the savage from the door. At length the 
colonies numbered three millions of people, and the tyrannies, 
taxes, and insolence of King George became insufi'erable. He 
refused his assent to needful laws, dissolved their representative 
houses, harassed the people by a swarm of petty officers, kept 
a standing army among them in time of ])eace to eat out their 
substance, cut off their trade, imposed heavy taxes, deprived 
the people of trial by jury, took away their charters, abolished 
their laws, plundered their seas, ravaged their coasts, burned 
their towns, excited insurrections, stirred up the .Indians to 
murder alike both sexes, and all ages. His injuries, usurpations, 
and atrocities became unendurable. For such a crisis as this 
the scions of New England were prcparc*d. They sounded the 
war-cry and fought 'the battle of Lexington. The spirit of 
resistance became contagious, and common dangers united the 
country for its common defense. On the 4th of July, 1776, the 
immortal heroes and patriots of thirteen colonies adopted the 
Declaration of Independence. It was a thunderbolt hurled 
against tyranny. It was read to the troops at the beat of the 
drum. Kinging bells, roaring cannon, and a defiant people 
said : All men are created free and equal in their right to life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. 

This was the Old Testament of American liberty. Its New 
Testament is the Proclamation of Emancipation issued by our 



martyr-President, "of blessed memory, Abraham Lincobi, Janu- 
ary 1, 1863, giving freedom to four millions of slaves. The one 
was the Genesis of freedom, M'hich amidst thunders and lightnings, 
and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the noise of the trumpet 
waxing louder and louder, made King George and the people in 
his camp tremble. It was the new law of liberty saying to the 
land : Thou shalt have no other gods before me. The other is 
the new Evangel opening its anointed lips upon the mount of 
beatitudes, saying: Blessed are the merciful, for they shall 
obtain mercy. Hence a double joy thrills the heart of the 
Kepublic to-day. Two celebrations, like two mighty rivers, 
unite in one, and make the spectacle of their majesty more sub- 
lime. One celebrates a declaration of noble principles never 
fully carried out ; the other the practical application of these 
principles ; one a country declared to be free and equal in 
natural rights, the other a country actually made so ; the one 
a freedom of white me.i, the other a freedom of both black and 
white. 

Is it any wonder then why patriotic America is more than 
ever jubilant to-day? Tlie munificence of heaven gave this 
country to our fathers, as it gave Canaan to Abraham. God 
said to them as he said to him : Lift- up now thine eyes, and 
look from the place where tliou art northward and soutJivxird, 
and eastward, and westward ; for all the land which thou seest, 
to thee will I give it, and to thy seed forever. And I will make 
thy seed as the dust of tlie earth : so that if a man can number 
the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. 
Arise, walk through the land in the length of it, and in the 
breadth of it ; for I will give it unto thee. This is the real origin 
of the Monroe doctrine. It is God's voice to a pioneer seed. 
It means that we have a perfect right to lift up our eyes to every 
point of the compass, because the eternal law of destiny has 
made this country ours forever, and the people of it shall be as 
the dust of the earth and as the stars of heaA'en ; and not Eng- 
land, nor France, nor Spain, nor Austria, nor Maximilian, nor all 
their hostile alliances, intrigues, and hypocrisies combined, can 
fold the wings of our Eagle, halt the march of our Banner, or 
adjourn the destiny of this great Yankee Nation. 

Divine Providence to-day renews the great charter of Amer- 
ican independence, nationality and freedom to the loyal children 
of the Kevolutionary fathers. The Declaration of Indepen- 



10 

denee and the Proclamation of Freedom compliment cacli other. 
Justice and judgment have met together; righteousness and 
peace liave kissed each other. If our heroic fathers liad reason 
to rejoice, so have we more. The enthusiasm of their liberty 
rose above earthly majesty; the majesty of our liberty has tran- 
scended the villany of slavery and the sophistry of treason. 

Bullets and ballots represent ideas. The truth or falsity of 
these ideas is decided by victory or defeat. But when we be- 
hold their truth coronated with victory, liow can we restrain 
our joy ? AVhen we see the Union brought back, with its vic- 
torious heel on the neck of its foes, how is it possible to moderate 
our exultations ? lie who has fought for the glory of this day, 
either on the bloody field or at the triumphant ballot box, has 
earned a sacred right to rejoice. He knows the grounds of his 
intense gladness. By the memory of the terrible battle and the 
splendor of the victory his joy is augmented. 

What signitied, fellow-citizens, the life and death struggle on 
the 8th of November, when every ballot box in America was 
the sentry box of the nation's honor? 

It meant the heaviest blows ever struck for freedom on this 
continent ; the severest retribution upon Southern treason ; a 
firm foot on the neck of guilt ; a giant and deadly gripe on the 
throat of the great rebellion ; and a howling, shivering, and ter- 
ror-stricken fate for her fugitive majesty, Jefferson Davis. It 
meant for the insolent South bankruptcy, confiscation, smoking 
cities, desolated fields, charred bridges, torn-up railroads, a 
ragged, gannt, panic-stricken, and defeated army; and a heart- 
broken starving comnnmity, subsisting on the rations of the 
Union. It decided that the South, misled by wicked dema- 
gogues, should return to her allegiance to the Constitution and 
the laws ; that the rebeUs broken oath should be answered by 
the neo-ro's broken chain ; that the stupid heresy of state rights 
should perish ; and infamy marrow in the bones of treason. It 
is true you counted the cost and elected necessarily for ourselves 
rivers of tears, groans, debts, taxes, continuation of belligerent 
rights by hostile foreign powers, inability to aid liberty in 
Mexico, the building and equipping piratical vessels in the har- 
bors of England and France to capture and burn our ocean 
8hii)ping and break our blockade, murderous raids across our 
frontiers, the firing of our cities to destroy helpless women and 
children at midnight, the importation of pestilence from foreign 



11 

lazar-laonses, the scientific and inliiiman starvation of sixty thou- 
sand of our gallant prisoners in Soutliern cattle pens, and the 
infliction of barbarities -VYhich only fiends, inibruted by slavery and 
skillful. in savageism, could practice. You elected also an army 
of maimed and heroical cripples limping at our doors, a land of 
wailing widows and orphans crying for fathers and brothers far 
away in unknown sepulcliers, with faces upturned to the wild 
daisy and to God. 

All these unavoidable adjuncts were wrapped up in your bal- 
lots, which fell from your hands, like snow-Hakes and the foot- 
falls of angels, on the eighth of November. 

But you determined also on a steady and victorious march 
to nationality preserved, to the Union restored, and the reign of 
a lasting peace nnder republican institutions. You chose the 
preservation and grandeur of the old time-honored banner, 
borne in triumph over a thousand battle fields, with all its stars 
flaming and refulgent as the symbols of our liberty, union, and 
power. You said that eight millions of people, backed only by 
the sophist and the conspirator, were not enough to defy twenty 
millions grounded in eternal justice and truth ; that the will of 
the majority w^as tlie voice of God, and should be respected ; 
that a citizen once constitutionally elected President of the 
whole United States^ should really be so ; that three hundred 
thousand slaveholders, oligarchs, and monsters of humanity, should 
not rebel against the ballot box and strangle the liberties of 
thirty-five millions ; that blear-eyed fanaticism, enlisted against 
freedom should not longer mock the rights of man and repress 
human progress ; that the foul leprosy of slavery should not 
poison w^ith its virus the pure blood of our free Columbia ; that 
obedience to the will of the majority should still be the angel of 
redemption to beckon on the nations to liberty and free govern- 
ment ; that foreign despots and aristocracies, wedded to hostile 
policies and narrow self-hoods, should not build still higher and 
stronger their serf-filled dungeons with our broken hearthstones ; 
that Northern civilization, based on free labor and free soil and 
liberal intelligence, shonld not longer tamely succumb to the 
starved and grisly ghost of Southern retrogression, grounded 
upon human slavery and popular ignorance ; that a prejudiced 
and embittered community, who, for seventy years, had elected 
and controlled the Government and the Supreme Court, muzzled 
the press, hung padlocks on the lips of free Sj^eech, banished the 



12 

scliool-lionse, profaned the sanctity of marriage, and subsidized 
dnelinij, lynch law, and treason, to lay hold on horror and terrify 
mankind into subjection to their barbarous institutions, should 
not now, because defeated in a presidential election, tear down 
tlie foundations of the temple of liberty and bury its worshipers 
in its ruins. You elected a chastening rod to flagellate rebel- 
lious children, lost to all reason and arts of persuasion, into sub- 
jection to lawful authority ; that those who meant no Union 
should have no quarte|| that courage and numbers, backed by 
the spirit of the age and the genius of war, should rain shot 
and shell, until the impudent sophistry and the monstrous trea- 
son should cry enough ; that the Jacobin junta of five hundred 
thoiisand secret, oath-bound, treasonable and midnight assassins 
and sympathizers in the North under the lead of Vallandigham, 
should be the execrated Benedict Arnolds of American history, 
in all time to come ; that the war was not a failure, but a stupend- 
ous success, and only those were failures who uttered such false- 
hoods ; and that the musket, and not the white feather, beckoning 
to disunion, was the shortest and the only road to peace. And 
time, which always decides for those who hesitate, has proved 
you were correct. You invoked not a sprinkle, but a deluge 
and a thunderbolt to strike treason for the benefit of liberty and 
justice, and to terrify braggart insolence into decent behavior. 
Y'^ou chose a root out of dry ground, having no form nor comeli- 
ness, nor beauty that it should be desired, yet as broad-souled 
as his wide-breasted prairies, and liberty-loving as the free winds 
tliat roared across them, and pure-spirited as the starry cope above 
liis rude home, to stretch out his long arms and save the Union. 

You said the only royalty w^orth respecting was immortal 
manhood, and the only lieraldry that of true liberty ; that the 
nations need no longer rummage for them among the musty 
parchments and records of nobles and kings ; that the rights of 
man are written with pointed diamonds and sunbeams, by 
infinite wisdom, on every page of human nature, and no hi])se 
of time or power of earth can erase or obscure them ; that 
natural liberty is the free gift of the ])eneficent Creator to 
the whole human race, and civil liberty is only natural liberty 
secured and regulated by civil society, on the majority prin- 
ciple, through the absolute monarchy of the ballot box ; that 
progress is king, universal suffrage his scepter, the earth his 
dominions, and time the lease of his power. These are some 



13 

of tlie great things, fellow-citizens, jou. said on that memo- 
rable day. O, Ave struck great blows for universal liberty 
flnd humanity. We wrestled witli tyranny and oppression 
at the foot of every throne on the planet. It was the crisis 
of the war and the turning point in the tide of events. It 
settled great questions. It uttered the final judgment of 
the nation. It was the voice of a great multitude, and of 
many w^aters, and of mighty thunderings, saying: Alleluia! 
From that day the enemy was discouraged and demoralized, 
and the friends of the Union were jubilant. No doubt remained 
but that two things would be speedily accomplished ; the Union 
would be preserved, and slavery would be abolished. Nor have 
we been disappointed. The integrity of the nation is vindicated, 
and four millions of slaves, who for weary years, have brought 
in vain their tale. of woe, and laid their pleading story at Colum- 
bia's feet, are forever free. A great prophecy has been fulfilled. 
Ethiopia has stretched out her hands nnto God. Seldom have 
such canticles of joy rocked the starry dome since the matin 
planets sung together and all the sons of God shouted in jubila- 
tion. By breaking down the pro-slavery aristocracy of the 
South, and dignifying labor, by making it free and remunerative, 
we have given liberty to four millions of " poor whites." "VVe 
have purged the Supreme Court of its contempt of the natural 
and civil rights of man, by elevating that well learned cham- 
pion of universal freedom, equality and brotherhood, Salmon P. 
Chase, to the Chief Justiceship, to expound the new law of 
liberty to a nation of freemen. We have put new honor upon 
labor by taking from it the degradation of chains and the sting 
of the lash. It is no longer servile drudgery or predial toil, but 
independent, free, earning and appropriating its own wages, 
educating cliildhood, providing for worship, festooning and 
adorning the earth with artistic beauty and industrial improve- 
ments, economizing w^ealth and eating its own bread in the 
sweat of its honest face. We have given new and marvelous value 
to the unproductive lands in the late slave States by redeeming 
them from the ignorance, indolence, and curse of slavery and 
its miserable husbandr}", and opening them np to the enter]U"ise, 
skill, and muscle of free labor and free wages. When the New 
England plough shall burst open their rich subsoil, and North- 
ern methods of tillage, energy, and labor-saving machines shall 



14 

surprise the sluggishness and autenmndane ideas of tlie sunny- 
South, both crops and lauds will reduplicate their values. 

Grand and glorious pages enrich and adorn the historic 
chapters of the nation's life. More has been accomplished than 
the human mind, at present, perceives. Vital principles have 
been crystallized, strong currents of intelligent inspiration and 
enterprise wisely started and directed, white-crested waves of 
observation uplifted and pushed out to distant shores, new 
activities excited, new views welcomed, new opinions accepted, 
and new trains put in motion wdiose progressive momentum no 
power on earth can either moderate or halt. Reconstructions 
and uses compose the new cycle of human life to which all are 
now intromitted. Sublime is the spectacle of our rapid speed. 
The iron horse wdiicli whirls and hurries us along possesses a 
heart of burning coals, a neck clothed with thunder, and nostrils 
teri'ible in the glory of flames. He paweth in the valU^y and 
panteth to be gone. lie rejoiceth in the freshness and vehe- 
mence of his strength, lie goeth on to meet the armed men. 
He mocketh at fear and is not aifrighted. He turnetii Jiot back 
from the sword. The quiver rattleth against him, the glittering 
spear and the shield. He swalloweth the ground with fierce- 
ness and rage. He saith he hears the trumpet-call. He snuffs 
the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, the cry of 
princes, and the battle-shout. 

To those who still cling to old economies, old wives' fables, 
old traditions of the elders, and dead men's bones, we say by 
way of friendly warning, I.ooh out for the engine ivhen the hell 
rings. 

I have said the freedom of four millions of slaves is one of 
the glorious results of this war. But as slavery darkened the 
splendor, and belied the principles of the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, let us see to it that the terrible prejudices against the 
negroes, which survive the abolition of their slavery, together 
w^ith the old slave codes and legal disfranchisements, do not 
render the Proclamation of Emancipation equally impotent. 
What sort of freedom, fellow-citizens, have wx given these 
freedmen ? Is it the freedom of the Declaration of Indepen- 
dence and of the Constitution ? of life, liberty, the pursuit of 
happiness, citizenship, suffrage, and the musket ? Or is it that 
of Lazarus, resurrected, yet bound, motioidess, and napkined 
witli grave clothes, with no potential and mandatory caergy in 



15 

the Proclamation of Emancipation and in tlie Constitution to say : 
Loose him and let him go? Is the slave code to dominate after 
slavery is dead ? the three-fifths rule to continue in force, and 
subject theKorth to an unfair partition of political power ? "We 
are sailing on treacherous and unknown seas, and unless we 
take soundings as we go, we may suddenly run upon perilous 
fehoals and breakers. Let us address ourselves candidly and 
earnestly to these inquiries. The stiff-necked loyalty, patriot- 
ism, and courage of President Johnson challenge our admira- 
tion and confidence. They have been tested in the fiery fur- 
nace and fused into a pure button of gold. With no expecta- 
tions of political preferment, and menaced by the rancor and 
fury of the conspirators backed by the intense rage of the 
whole slave power, his pure patriotism and loyalty towered 
sublimely above the ties and demands of a partisan self-hood, 
and in the LTuited States Senate, prior to the inauguration of 
President Lincoln, planted themselves squarely on the rock of 
the Union. We M'ell remember the confused noise and havoc 
of the shot and shell he rained upon the traitors. From that 
day forward his career has been one of audacity against his 
country's foes, and stout-hearted devotion to the national cause. 
Springing from the people and destined to be their jiivotal 
representative, his noble manhood has been crystallized from 
the foul mother- waters of popular ignorance below him, and of 
pro-slavery oligarchism above him, into the sturdy hexagonal 
gem of liberty, patriotism, nationality, pluck, labor, and popu- 
lar rights. During the late presidential canvass I devoted my 
best powers in advocating his claims before the people. My con- 
fidence in his administration is still unabated, and, like a pas- 
senger on board a ship at sea, though storm and night, and winds 
and waves beleaguer the vessel, I trust to the skill, experience, 
and courage of the captain to keep her right side u-p, and 
bring her safely across unknown seas to a tranquil port. My 
honest convictions incline me to the belief that the President is 
not only willing, but extremely anxious to confer, on wise con- 
ditions, universal suffrage on all the free citizens of America, 
irrespective of color or creed. But the time-grown, and case- 
hardened prejudices of the South against negro equality create 
many and serious embarrassments. In consulting, however, the 
future safety and tranquillity of the nation, it must not be for- 
gotten that prejudice is ephemeral, and justice eternal ; and that 



16 

a people just emerging from anarchy and treason, and still 
wedded to an institution whieli has caused all our national 
humiliation and distress, have forfeited their right to decide on 
what terms they will submit to tlie future peace and prosperity 
of the nation. 

To judge of the President's policy of reconstruction and 
what the remedy will be, in case of its failure, we must consider 
the present relation of the ex-insurrectionary States to their 
state constitutions, to the sovereignty of the United States, and 
to the three-fifths rule of representation. 

That a State cannot secede from the Federal Union has been 
forever decided by the arbitrament of war. Consequently all 
the ex-insurgent States are still indissolubly in the Union. But 
treason has wronght fundamental changes. It has abolished 
slavery, rendered obsolete the entire slave code, and vitiated 
and nullified, on the part of the people, all the constitutions of 
the rebellious States. When the ordinances of secession were 
passed the State constitutions were abandoned. Every officer 
renounced his allegiance to the Union, an oath of which is neces- 
sary to quality an officer, either of a State, or of the United 
States. But were these constitutions dead with respect to 
the Union ? By no means. The national sovereignty, as well 
as the States, stood related to these local charters. Congress 
originally acknowledged their validity, and permitted the States 
to live under them. Has any act of Congress consented to their 
nullification? Too loose and vague notions prevail respecting 
the national sovereignty. The States, admitted since the adop- 
tion of the Constitution, are integral parts of the nation, and are 
older than their constitutions. Both the territory and peo}de of 
which they are composed were subject to the absolute national 
sovereignty prior to their organization as States. Their ccmsti- 
tutions have nothing whatever to do in making them conq)onent 
parts of the Union. They are only objective manifestos of the 
wishes and intentions of certain portions of the American people 
who occupy in common the national domain, and who are abso- 
lutely subject to the national sovereignty. The nationality, in 
the plenitude of its gra('C, permits different communities, differ- 
ently circumstanced as to climate, productions, and occupations, 
to frame Constitutions, embodying tl eir chosen methods of 
local self-government, if republican in form, and subordinate to 
the Constitution of the United States, to be acknowledired or 



17 

rejected by Congress. But high over all her domains,' protected 
equally by the star-spangled banner, the United States stretches 
the long arms of her omnipotence. Wherever that starry symbol 
floats the sovereign power of the nation is present. The soil of 
America acknowledges only the cry of one eagle, and the 
dominion of one flag. Her utmost frontiers, with uncovered 
heads, and open mouths, listen to the edicts of only one monarch, 
more potential and clarion than those of emperors or kings, 
because they nre the edicts of a monarch who never dies, whose 
right to rule no power on earth is strong enough to dispute, the 
monarch of the law, legislated by Congress, pronounced consti- 
tutional by the Supreme Court, and executed by the Chief 
Magistrate of the nation. 

This is our King, whose throne is the will of the majority of 
the American people, whose subjects are States and Territories, 
whose symbols (»f royalty are the eagle and the flag, ^vhose 
birth-day is the Declaration of Independence, whose baton is the 
Constitution, whose baptism is the Avar of the Revolution and 
the Avar against treason, whose coronation is the Proclamation 
of Emancipation, whose attributes are union, jnstice, domestic 
trancpiillity, '''common tlefense, general Avelfare, and universal 
liberty, and whose right to rule is immortal manhood and the 
voice of Jehovah. 

From this appear the monstrous folly and guilt of those 
public thieves who thought, because they had stolen muskets and 
bonds and repudiated debts, they could steal States, like Loui- 
siana and Texas, which w^ere purchased with the nation's gold. 
The thirteen original States which belonged to the old Con- 
federation consummated this Union by ratifying the Federal 
Constitution. Yet these States did not make it. The people, in 
their sovereign capacity, had created it, and the States, as organ- 
ized portiolis of the people, accepted it and agreed to be bound 
by it. The clause in the preface to the Constitution, " We, the 
People of the United States," clearly shows the source of its au- 
thority. It emanated from the whole people, nerving themselves 
up to the height of the great work. The States had nothing to 
do with it until they fell prostrate before the supremacy of its 
matchless wisdom and power, and felt beneath them the strong 
arms of its omnipotence lifting them up into the dignity and 
importance of States. They then felt for the first time the vital 
breath from its nostrils which gave them union, justice, dc- 
2 



18 

mestic trunquillitj, a common defense, general welfare, and the 
blessings of liberty. I^ew States are now admitted by a sove- 
reign act of Congress. ^Tlie United States, in the exercise of its 
plenary sovereignty, allows a cei'tain number of its people, occu- 
pying a given portion of its domain, to form a constitution, to 
be submitted to Congress, to enable tliat body, who are the 
custodians of the national sovereignty, to judge whether or not 
it is republican in form and subordinate to the Federal Consti- 
tution, before admitting the eonunmiity desiring to live under 
it to the blessings of a local domestic government, witli a limited 
and subordinate sovereignty. The right and power of Congress 
thus to admit new States, accept their constitutions if re})ub- 
lican in form, and secure to the people under them the rights, 
privileges, and imnmnities of a subordinate organization, in- 
volves also the right and })0wer to prevent the abandonuient 
and nullilication of those constitutions by any capricious and 
ex parte acts of those States. "What supreme and crowning act 
is it that gives validity to a state constitution '^ Is it not the linal 
act of admission by Congress ? Should Congress reject an ap- 
plication of an incholiate State fur admission, would its constitu- 
tion survive the mortal thrust ? If then States cannot make 
their constitutions, can they unmake them ? If it require an 
act of Congress to make them valid, does it not also require one 
to render them invalid? Can a rebellious minor slip ont from 
the lingers of parental authority when he chooses? Has not 
the parent the right to flagellate the delinquent back to his 
duty? The people of the ex-insurrectionary States, having dis- 
rupted the conditions of their admission into the Union, ^-acated 
their offices under their constitutions, abandoned them for ordi- 
nances of secession, and renounced their allegiance to the United 
States, have, so far as they are concerned, rendered their con- 
stitutions null and void, and remanded themselves back into an 
unorganized condition, under the absolute and disposing sove- 
reignty of the United States. This is their self-chosen status. 
On the other hand, it is optional with the United States, in the 
exercise of its supreme sovereignty, to consent to this abandon- 
ment and nullity of their constitutions on their ])art, or to com- 
pel them to return to their allegiance to the Union, under their 
old constitutions, fill their vacated offices by popular elections, 
as prescribed by their old chartersi, in pursuance of writs of 



19 

election issued by the President, and ]3iit tlieir state govcraments 
in motion as of old. 

But bj the constructive legislation of Congress, and the exec- 
utive proclamation, the United States have consented, on their 
part, to acknowledge and complete the nullity of these consti- 
tutions. For most of these States the President, representing 
the United States, in juirsuance of his oath to " preserve, pro- 
tect, and defend the Constitution of the United States," which 
guarantees " a republican form of government to every State in 
this Union," and W'hich requires him to " take care that the 
laws be faithfully executed," has appointed Provisional Govern- 
ors, with authority to convene representative Conventions, elect- 
ed by electors composed of white loyal citizens and pardoned 
rebels, qualified according to the old state constitutions as they 
existed immediately prior to the ordinances of secession. He 
had an undoubted constitutional riglit to adopt this policy of re- 
construction. The only question which divides the opinions of 
loyal men is whether it was wise to prescribe the same qualifica- 
tions for the electors of these conventions which are set forth in 
those defunct state constitutions. He has an unquestionable 
right to prescribe such qualifications as he deems proper, pro- 
vided they do not conflict with a republican form of govern- 
ment. These conventions are to frame new state constitutions 
and settle the question of the elective franchise. The President, 
it is believed, desires that the right of suftrage shall be extend- 
ed to the freedmen. If so, why did he not empower them to 
become electors of the members of these conventions ? It may 
be, in the generosity and confidence of his nature, he thought 
he would avoid enlisting against the work of reconstruction the 
terrible prejudice of the whites against the blacks, by presuming 
upon the good sense and wisdom of the whites, spontaneously 
exj^ressed in deference to the national sentiment and tlie rights 
of the freedmen, and domestic tranquillity, to extend to them 
the elective franchise in the new constitutions. 

It must be conceded this would be a wise stroke of policy 
should such a desirable object be realized. But is there any 
hope of such a result? In my judgment not the least. These 
conventions will be chiefly composed of pardoned rebels. Their 
hatred of the negro is proverbial. The prejudice of two hun- 
dred 3'ears, embittered by defeat contributed in part by the ex: 
slaves, will be more likely to seek new methods of retaliation 



20 

and revenge than additional grants of liberty to the nianmnit- 
ted captives. "We may take it for granted then that these con- 
ventions \vill frame constitutions disfranchising tlie freedmen. 
What tlien ? Is all lost ? Is the three-fifths rule to prevail ? 
Are pardoned rebels, with the foot of the national sovereignty 
flat on their necks, to cheat fonr millions of sable freemen out 
of their guaranteed liberty, and the North out of eqnalitv ? Not 
at all. But let us look at a probable state of facts. 

We will suppose the new constitutions adopted and the ne- 
groes disfranchised. Under them Members of Congress are to 
be elected. The Constitution of the United States, Article First 
aud Sec. Second, says : " Representatives and direct taxes shall be 
apportioned among the several States which may be included 
within this Union, according to their respective numbers, which 
shall be determined by adding to the whole nnmber of free per- 
sons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and 
excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other jpersonsP 
The words, " other ])ersons^'' mean other than " free persons," or 
slaves. According to the Census of 1860 the slaves numbered 
four millions. Three fifths of four millions are two millions and 
four hundred thousand. This latter number of slaves is equal 
in representative value to the same number of whitur- at the 
North. Here is equality for you at the ballot box, between two 
millions and four hundred thousand slaves (now free) in the 
South, and an equal number of whites at the North. YetT^e 
you degraded by it? Has it hurt you very badly ? Tlie nun.- 
ber of persons in each of the United States entitled to one rep- 
resentative in Congress is one hundi'cd and twenty-seven thou- 
sand. Consequently the slave States had in the last (bngress, 
prior to their secession, eighty -four members ; sixt3'-six due to 
their white population, and eighteen to three fifths of their 
slaves. But in the next election there will be no "other per- 
sons," or slaves, in the South. The Census and apportionment 
of members of Congress made in 1860 hold good until 1870. 
Consequently the ex-slave States will return, as in 1860, eight- 
teen mcmbci's as the representative value of " three fifths of all 
other pcrsons,^^ although no such " other 2)ersons " exist, being 
all free. Besides, alter 1870, when the new Census and appor- 
tionment are taken, if this injustice goes on, the ex-slave States 
will gain the representative benefit of the other two filths. The 
whole luimber of " free pei'sons " will constitute the basis of rep- 



21 

resentation. Allowing the population then to he no more than 
in 1860, they will return in the ratio of ninety-seven members, 
sixty-six for the whites and thirty-one for the blacks. Besides, 
what adds increased pungency to this cup of wormwood and 
gall, held up to the lips of liberty, is the fact that these mem- 
bers are not elected by the ex-slaves to represent their new lib- 
erties and their love of the Union for this boon, but by pardoned 
rebels to represent their lip-loyal ity and hatred and oppression 
of the neo;ro. Add to this another ag-o-ravation. The number 
of whites now in the late slave States is much less than in 1860, 
when the last Census and apportionment were made. By the 
casualties of war many have perished, many are excepted from 
the executive amnesty, and considerable numbers, it is not un- 
likely, will emigrate to Europe and Mexico. It is computed by 
respectable authorities that the number of whites at the next 
election will be at least one third less than at the Census of 
1860. By a most singular turn of events it thus appears that 
the numerically reduced whites of the ex-slave States will elect 
eighty-four members to the next Congress, when in justice and 
ec[uity they should elect only forty-four. Against this large 
representation an equal numl)er of white persons in the North 
can S(>',] constitutionally only forty -four members instead of 
eighty-four ; being in the ratio of about one to two. Should 
General Lee be pardoned and restored to the right of suffrage, 
he would wield, according to these estimates, precisely the same 
'power, at the ballot box, as our gallant Generals Grant and 
Sherman. After 1870 his power will be still more formidable, 
because the other two fifths of the ex-slaves will be counted. 
They conquered him by the sword. Shall he now conquer them 
by the ballot? Either the cx-slavcs must hereafter cast their 
own votes and elect their own members, or the Constitution 
must be purged of this monstrous injustice and odious inequal- 
ity of representation : for if any man thinks that four millions 
of free blacks at the South, with the right to bear arms and de- 
fend their liberty, and with the blood of their masters in their 
veins, backed by twenty-five millions of free whites at the 
Xortli, are going tamely to succumb to such an atrocious out- 
rage upon liberty and equality, by eiglit millions of chiefly de- 
feated and pardoned traitors and sympathizers with them, he is 
either stupidly ignorant, or stubbornly infatuated. Can you tell 
me why, in electing a President or mend)ers of Congress, I 



22 

sliould have only one vote and a pardoned rebel two ? Is loyal- 
ity to pay such a premium to treason ? Does victory owe such 
a holocaust to defeat ? Does the earth move ? Has there been 
a war ? Does God reign ? Is there any voice left in the secret 
])lace of thunder ? Has the Constitution lost its gripe ? Is the 
old spirit dead ? Are wc still to bo a nation of slaves ? Have 
we borne the injustice so long that we have become used to it 
and do not care for it ? Have we hardened, to insensibility, like 
the skin of an ass, M'hich grows tougher by beating? Or do we 
prefer longer to keep this itch upon the epidermis of the body 
politic for the pleasure of scratching ? Xo caustic ridicule can ad- 
ecpiately mock this absurdity. Ko, fellow citizens, this war 
means liberty in good earnest, and unto all. It means the ap- 
plication of thepi'inciples of the Declaration of Independence to 
the whole population of America, for the first time in the his- 
tory of the nation. It heralds forth e(piality of right to life, lib- 
erty, suffrage, and the pursuit of ha}»piness. It signifies the un- 
profitableness of injustice, the difference between skinning and 
being skinned, and a common platform, before the law, on 
which all the free citizens of the republic are to stand. After 
the new Census and apportionment of ISTO, unless the free 
blacks shall be permitted to cast their own vote, or the 
Constitution be altered so that they shall not be counted, the 
ex-slave States will gain a new ]^olitical power. Tliey will off- 
set the entire ex-slave population at the South against an espial 
number of white persons at the Xortli. This unjust and over- 
whelming political power the southern ex-rebels will wield to 
oppress the blacks and bully the North. Are wc to be forever 
cursed with this dead carcass of Slavery ? In every view we 
take of it this old cheat and injustice of a sti'angled institution, 
.clutching desperately in its death spasms for a longer and larg- 
er lease of its despotism, only whirls down upon -it infinite dis- 
gust and loathing. Shall its grisly ghost, exasperated at the 
death of its body, swear new vengeance against liberty and do- 
mestic tranquillity at the ballot box ? Shall the furious specter 
still puff its grinning gauntness on the cheated hopes of human- 
ity, or now, Avhen the national sovereignty has its pulverizing 
heel squarely on its neck, be made to lay hold on horror in She- 
oV& drowsy shades ? Are we not sufilciently outwearied by its 
insolence? Has it not helped us to enough tears, groans, del)ts, 
blootl, ruin, and graves? Shall the free blacks of the South, 



23 

and the loyal ISTorth be compelled to march throngh another war 
to an impartial siiffrage ? Have we conquered this slave-hold- 
ers' rebellion only to increase its political power ? Shall we say 
to blood-dripping treason : We outnumbered 3'our muskets only 
that you may outnumber our votes ? we have treated you to a 
23ardon only that you may repay us Avith a stretcher ? 

But suppose these Conventions frame Constitutions which 
disfranchise the ex-slaves, provide for them no system of educa- 
tion, disqualify them from holding real estate, testifying in 
the courts, and holding political meetings, must they be sanc- 
tioned by the United States ? Must the foul leprosy still mar- 
row in the bones of the body politic? Must the same spirit 
which caused the late war reai)pear in a new form ? Is there 
no balm in Gilead ? Is there no physician there? Yes, fellow 
citizens, there is a sovereign remedy. The swift specific exists in 
the Constitution, and must be administered by Congress. When 
these eic'htv-four members, elected bv virtue of the provisions 
of their new coilstitutions, shall knock at the door of Congress 
for admission, Congress will have authority to say : You cannot 
enter. Our authority for this decision is found in the First Ar- 
ticle and Fifth Section of the Constitution, and reads thus : 
"Each house shall be the judge of the elections, returns, and 
Cjualilications of its own members." The ground on which we 
are compelled to adjudge you disqualified is that you are the 
representatives of an oligarchical, and not a republican form of 
government. The Fourth Section of the Fourth Article of the 
Constitution says: "The United States shall guarantee to every 
State in this Union a republican form of government." Such 
a form of government is elected by a majority of its free male 
citizens twenty-one years of age and upwards. Tlie returns 
show that you have been elected by a minority, based on color, 
at the expense of the disfranchisement of from one third to one 
half of the free male citizens of your respective States. The 
United States have declared this disfranchised portion of your 
-peo-ple freemen. The Declaration of Independence declares them 
equal in natural riglit to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi- 
ness. They have performed services for the Union as soldiers, 
sailors, guides, servants, and laborers, under a promise of guaran- 
teed freedom. The national faith and honor are pledged to ful- 
fil this promise. The gratitude of the nation, not less than 
equal iustice and right, requires that native-born men who have 



te 



24 

aided the Union in taking away tlie muskets of tiieir rebel mas- 
ters, and wlio have thereby gained their liberties, shall also en- 
joy the elective franchise to legislate for their consummation 
and preservation. A government elected and administered by 
tlie few is an oligarchy. But a government chosen and con- 
ducted by the many is a republic. The conclusion is therefore 
inevitable : you are the representatives of an oligarchy, and not 
of a government republican in form. Your constitutions are un- 
acceptable. They are based on a sweeping ostracism of one 
tldrd, and in the gulf States, one half, of your male population, 
whom the United States, by its sovereign will, have endowed 
with unabridged citizenship. The Constitution therefore com- 
mands us to dechu'e tliem null and void, and your elections, un- 
der them, illegal. We are made the absolute judges of the 
elections, returns, and cjualifications of our members, and the 
Constitution positively enjoins us, in the examination of the cre- 
dentials of new members, coming hither with new and unac- 
cepted constitutions, to " guarantee to every State in this Union 
a republican form of government." Your constitutions are vi- 
tiated by rejuvenating the old slave code. Slavery is forever 
dead, and its death involves the obsoleteness of that code. All 
the state laws and federal, together with the constitutional 
clauses, which create disabilities, disfranchisements, representa- 
tions by proxy, and rendition of persons " held to service" who 
are fugitives from their own State, on account of color, are all 
powerless. For when the reason for a law or constitutional 
provision ceases, the law or provision itself becomes obsolete. 
It cannot be regalvanized into life and used against freedom. 
You cannot use the Fugitive Slave Law to catch slaves for 
South Carolina, for the simple reason that she has none. You 
cannot hang white men in Georgia for teaching slaves to read, 
because none now clank their chains there beneath the old flag. 
You cannot longer count " three fifths of all other persons" as 
Set forth in the Second Section of the First Article of the Con- 
stitution, in apportioning representatives and direct taxes among 
the States, for the reason that no such " other j^ersons " exist. 
For a like reason the last part of the Second Section, under Ar- 
ticle Four of the Constitution, relating to returning a " person 
held to service " is obsolete. All this old scaffolding around the 
fair Temple of Liberty, which has so long marred its symmetry 
and obscured its grandeur, is forever torn down. Yet you comf* 



25 

hither with eightj-fonr members, eighteen of wliom liare no 
voting constituency^ but are elected by voters who had already 
elected their own quota. Who ever heard of tlie same constitu- 
ency, under a strictly rej^iiblican government, electing two sets 
of representatives, except by special constitutional compromise, 
as heretofore in your case ? But the rcfason for that special pro- 
vision having ceased, the provision itself is inoperative. You 
must therefore return to your respective States, call a conven- 
tion, as in the case of a territory 'forming a state government, of 
all the free male citizens twenty-one years of ago and upwards, 
excepting the insane, idiots, and unj>ardoned criminals and trai- 
tors, and adopt constitutions i-epublican in form, and purged of 
the slave code; gi'auting and guaranteeing ecpudity to all before 
the law ; ])roviding, without distinction of color or creed, a 
common system of education, and conferring on all free male 
citizens, who have attained their majority, and who are not dis- 
qualified by crime, idiocy, or insanity, the right of the elective 
Iranchise ; declare the blacks to be comj^etent witnesses in the 
courts, subject to the same conditions as the whites, and ordain 
equal laws and riglils to all to acquire, hold, enjoy, and defend 
real and personal property, life, liberty, and the ]:)ursuit of ra- 
tional happiness. Organize your state governments upon such 
a free and equal basis, elect members of Congress by a majority 
of all your freemen, and your constitutions will be accepted, 
your representatives welcomed and admitted, and you will then 
have a republican form of government, which the United States 
are commanded to guarantee to every State in this Union. The 
UTnion has helped you to a constitutional number of bullets, you 
must now help the Union to a constitutional nunjber of ballots. 

This, fellow-citizens, appears to me to be the only final 
sheet-anchor of our hopes, in case the conventions fail to adopt 
republican constitutions. It seems to be the only constitutional 
and lawful compass by which we can safely sail across the dan- 
gerous and unknown seas beneath us, to the quiet haven of 
republican liberty and national tranquillity. 

What provident grants of power, full of vital potencies, our 
glorious fathers put into the Constitution, to slumber like germs 
in seeds, until the spring-time of their prolification should come ! 

Far-seeing and venerable men ! gazing down from the 
heights of forbidden wisdom on the ghastly crisis of this nether 
cloud-land, you struck in your day and generation heavier 



26 

blows for liiiman freedom than we had liitlierto known. The 
Cotistitation which jou bequeathed to ns gave peace and free- 
dom to only three millions of white colonists, but contained 
clanses potential with liberty and salvation to prodigal States, 
and destined in our day to ransom four millions of blacks, with 
four millions of " poor whites," from both physical and mental 
chains, and give tranquillity and jubilation to a nation ©f thirty- 
five millions! 

Nevertheless, although this ultimate and supreme remedy 
exists, in case the present experiment proves a failure to secure 
a republican reconstruction, I should feel profound regret to see 
the national sovereignty slacken its grasp upon this almshouse 
of sullen and gaunt rebels, who still nurse their suppressed trea- 
son, while they extend their dripping palms for the rations of 
the Union, and make swift haste to reinvest themselves with the 
civil power, terminate the military surveillance, consummate the 
re-enslavement of the blacks, and put on their former insolent 
airs. We should not forget that two hundred years have de- 
veloped an overweening spirit of mastery in the South. An 
absolute made7'y over slaves has engendered a dominant aristoc- 
racy, based on the degradation of labor, and produced the pesti- 
lent heresy of State-Supremacy. This spirit cannot be gener- 
ously trusted to kill itself by its own legislation. It will struggle 
with renewed vehemence to lift itsclt" up from its present humil- 
iation, and show to the world the vigor of its ancient muscle. 
From policy it holds its hand upon its mouth to keep down the 
tumultuous lava of its rage and treason, while it hurries up the 
work of reconstruction. I greatly suspect it. I know it so well 
that 1 have not a particle of confidence in it. What it needs is 
a thunderbolt to pulverize it finer than the light. The Union 
must break it, or it will break the Union. The two cannot live 
together. The earth is too narrow to hold them both. Now is 
the time to crush it forever. The only way to deal it its final 
death blow is to prevent the whites' political supremacy by ex- 
tending: universal suffrage to the slaves. When this is done, 
liberty will have a new meaning in the South. Four millions 
of voices will prolong its jubilant chorus. The effect will be as 
sudden as the great thunder of God. It will humiliate and sub- 
due the slave-spirit, by taking away its political strength, and it 
will also emasculate for all time to come that dangerous party 
of the South and North together, whose cohesive power is the 



27 

pro-slavery spirit of supremacy, and wliose ever fulminating 
threat is rule or ruin. Our greatest clanger lies in having 
reconstruction come too quick. The children of Israel had to 
wander in the wilderness forty years after they crossed the Kcd 
Sea. The reconstructionists among them muttered and mur- 
mured perpetually. They neither knew JNFoses nor the promised 
land, but waxed eloqnent over the leeks and onions of Egypt. 
We have not yet reached Mount Nebo. We have just entered 
the Wilderness, after singing with Miriam on the other side of 
the Red Sea. Long and tedious marches are before us, to out- 
weary the fossils, thin out the antemundancs, kill off the leek 
and onion-lovers, and crystallize a peo])le whose religion 
shall consist of faith in God, and equal justice t<^ man. 
If we get into Canaan sooner than the Israelites did, we shall 
either have to go across-lots, or silence these murmuring hosts 
by the smiting rod of the national sovereignty, and march for- 
ward to the music of Hail Columbia. These Amalekites must 
be consumed. Their king is Agag, the spirit of Slavery, Aris- 
tocracy, and State-Supremacy. As his sword has made women 
childless, so let his mother be chiklless among women. And 
let our Samuel hew this cruel Agag in pieces before the Lord. 
Pardon all rebeldom if it be deemed best, but equilibrate this 
clemency with the ballot and the musket to the freedmen, and 
let God defend the right. This condition would draw out the 
teeth from the jaw bone of Southern supremacy and treason. 
It would prove a ghastly nightuuire stalking through the land, 
and the buried groans of two hundred years would buryt forth 
into load hosannas. Some of our dear Southern l)rethren 
might get hurt, but do they not deserve iti Has not the day 
of vengeance come ? Speak, O stirring valley of dry l)ones, 
flagellated backs, unrequited toil, gaunt starvation, hruised 
souls, violated virtue, whipping posts, prison pens, auction 
blocks, bloodhounds, lynch law, and imbruted minds, and tell 
the fit measure of Jehovah's wrath ! All these brutalities I 
have seen, and I have no patience with leather-souled Christians 
who sing psalms, prate prayers, sympathize M'ith treason, de- 
fend slavery, denounce emancipation, and want the blessed in- 
stitution to go on. When I remember that God is just, that the 
law of action and reaction is equal, and that no human being 
can ill-treat another without himself, sooner or later, being ill- 
treated, I tremble for the gilded clay. The laws of retribution 



28 

are coeval with Jcliovali. The snpreiiie tribunal of the universe 
has [)ronounced thcni just, and Oninipotence is cliarij^ed with 
tlieir execution. Wluit power on earth can stay their ven- 
geance, or re})rievc the guilty ? No, fellow-citizens, this work 
mnst go on. The la\\~of progress is king. If you do not like 
him, help yourselves if you can. The Lord killeth and niaketh 
alive ; lie l)ringeth dow^n to the grave, and briugeth np. The 
Lord maketh poor, and maketh rich ; he briugeth low, and lift- 
eth np. lie raiseth np out of the dust, and lifteth np the beggar 
from the dunghill, to set theni among princes, and to make them 
inherit the tlirone of glory ; for the pillars of the earth are the 
Lord's, and he hath set the world upon them. He w^llkeep the 
feet of his saints, and the wicked shall be silent in darkness: for 
by strength shall no man prevail. The adversaries of the Lord 
shall be broken to pieces ; out of heaven shall he thunder npon 
them ; the Lord shall judge the ends of the earth, and he shall 
ffive streno'th unto his kino;, and exalt the horn of his anointed. 
But he that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of 
God. And then he sluiU be as the light of the morniiig, when 
the snn riseth, even a morning without clouds ; as the tender 
grass springing up out of the earth by clear shining. 

The strange ways of God are not restrained by statutes. 
The arrows of the lightning feel out their own ]»aths. Injus- 
tice cannot alw^ays be proiitable. As man is older than his 
clothing:, so immortal numhood antedates States and civil institu- 
tions. jSTatnral rights are ingrained and iiig<jspeled in nativ- 
ity. Civil society is a combination of men to protect them. 
When this just object for which governments are instituted fails, 
revolution comus and natural rights are insurgent. In this 
pleading condition, four millions of freedmen hail the national 
sovereignty and salute its starry banner. They ask for their 
natural rights. Shall they have them? They have hitherto 
stood related to the Union through their masters; they now 
come nearer and touch the hem of its garment with their own 
fingers. Shall the vii-tue of the nation go forth to meet them? 
Shall that imploritig touch thrill them with the ecstacies of life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of hapi)iness ? AVhat is their political 
status f To erush the rebelli(ui of their masters, the war ]>ower 
has justly set them free. The Constitutional Amendment will 
ratify the Executive Proclamation. They are also citizens of 
the ITnited States. Birth under the ilag, natural rights uiifor- 



29 

feited by crime, and freedom guaranteed by the national sov- 
ereignty, make them citizens. Tiiey are not only citizens, but 
entitled to claim and exercise the elective franchise under proper 
qualifications. Five states of the Union have sanctioned this 
civil status. Judge Curtis, late of the Supreme Court of the 
United States, in his dissent from the Dred Scott decision, says : 
" To determine whether any free persons, descended from Afri- 
cans held in slavery, were citizens of the United States under 
the Confederation, and consequently at the time of tlie adoption 
of the Constitution of the United States, it is oidy necessary to 
know whether such persons were citizens of either of the States 
under the Confederation, at the time of the adoption of the Con- 
stitution. Of this there can be no doubt. At the time of the 
ratification of the Articles of the Confederation, all free, native- 
born inhabitants of the States of l^ew Hampshire, Massachu- 
setts, New York, Xew Jersey, and North Carolina, thowjh de- 
scended from African slaves, were not only citizens of those 
States, hut such of them as had the other necessary qualifica- 
tions, possessed the franchise of electors, on equcd terms with 
other citizens." Corroborative of this view, Judge William 
Gaston, of the Supreme Court of North Carolina, the most dis- 
tinguished jurist who ever adorned the State, thus pronounced 
the decision of that Court in the case of the State against Man- 
uel : " According to the laws of this State, all human beings 
within it, who are not slaves, fall within one of two classes. 
Whatever distinctions may have existed in the Koman laws be- 
tween citizens and free inhabitants, they are unknown to our 
institutions. Before oin- Kevolution, all free persons born within 
the dominions of the king of Great Britain, whatever their color 
or complexion, were native-born British subjects; those born 
out of his allegiance were aliens. Slavery did not exist in Eng- 
land, but it did in the British Colonies. Slaves were not, in 
legal parlance, persons, but property. The moment the inca- 
pacity, the disqualification of slavery was removed, they be- 
came persons, and were then either British subjects, or not 
British subjects, according as they were or w^ere not born within 
the allegiance of the British king. Upon the Revolution, no 
other change took place in the laws of North Carolina than was 
consequent on the transition of a colony, dependent on a Euro- 
pean king, to a free and sovereign State. Slaves remained slaves. 
British subjects in North Carolina became North Carolina free- 



30 

men. Foreigners, until made members of the State, remained 
aliens. Slaves^ manumitted here^hecame freemen j and tJiere- 
fo7\\ ifborn toithin North Carolina^ are citizens of North Car- 
olina i and cdlfree persons, horn within the State, ar^e horn citi- 
zens of the State. The Constitution extended the elective fran- 
chise to every freeman ivho had arrived at the age of tv:erdy-one^ 
and paid, a puhlic tax / and it is a mcdter of universal notoriety^ 
that, under it, free persons, loitJiout regard to color, clcmned and 
cxercii-ed the franchise, until it was tahen from free men of 
color a few years since, hy our amended Constitidionr 

Chief Justice Chase, of the Supreme Court of the United 
States, in a recent letter to a committee of colored men in New 
Orleans, asserts, in very explicit language, that all the IVeedmen 
of tlie United States are citizens of the United States, and are 
also endowed with the right of claiming all their rights of 
citizenship. They have the further right to keep and bear arms. 
The Constitution says, under article second of the Amendments: 
" A Avell-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free 
state, tlie right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be in- 
fringed." The object in keeping and bearing arms is here con- 
structively alleged to be the security of a free state. If then 
the ex-slaves are free, citizens of the United States, with lights 
which cannot be infringed .to keep and bear arms to secure the 
freedom of a state, why shall they not vote % 

If they may shoot constitutionally to secure a free connnon- 
wealth, why may they not vote constitutionally for one? Is the 
bullet less harmless than the ballot % Ah ! that's the rub. Prcj*- 
udice, born of narrow self-hoods and mental pigmies, cries : Hate 
the negro, degrade him, kick him into the gutter, disfranchise 
him, and legislate him into a two hundred years' whisper lest he 
get ahead of me; bind, him with chains and then whip him be 
cause he cannot run ; imbrute his intellect, and then jeer him 
because he is not a Chief Justice of the law, a Solomon in wis- 
dom, or a David in psalmody. But broad -souled justice and 
humanity exclaim : Give him land on which to shout among his 
corn and ilocks, the Bible to show him the rounds of the ladder 
up the starry pathway, the spelling-l)ook to read the bright 
pages of the universe, the ballot to vote his laws, the musket to 
defend his liberty, and see what gems of immortality are pavil- 
ioned within the blackness of his skin. 

Does the bugbear of equality with the white man excite your 



31 

anger ? What do yon mean by a white man ? Did you ever see 
any white blood ? or white immortality ? Has not God made 
of one blood all the nations of the earth? Do, not the color and 
chemical composition of all human blood ]n-ove it? Surely • 
shivehoklers ought not to despise their own blood. Go and live 
in Africa a hundred years and you and your children would be as 
black as the ace of spades. Did negro citizenship and sutfrage 
for sixty years in Tsorth Carolina hurt anybody? But recently 
the mIxjIc South panted to die in the last ditch before tliey 
would brook subjugation. Yet, how it blessed them when it 
came ! ISTo one cried murder, but all were very glad to get 
something to eat. So they would season to negro suft'rage. 
Does the idea of miscegenation appal you? If the negro 
men were to vote would it increase your love for the negress ? 
"Would it add to her charms and endanger your heart? Are 
you afraid negro suffrage would augment your domestic pro 
clivities ? Go into the South and see how the absence of it has pol 
luted the land. Promiscuity of the most despicable character 
exists. Scarcely a pure-blooded African can be found in the South. 
Yellow slaves are quite as common as black ones. 1 have often 
seen them comparatively white. The blood of the master tiows 
in the veins of his slaves. This has been one of the direst 
evils of the system. Yet, with what holy horror these pinks of 
virtue deprecate injury to morals from negro suffrage ? But do 
politicians fear the freedmen, if permitted, will vote for their 
old masters ? Why did they not fight for them ? Has not their 
conduct declared the direction of their sympathies ? Is there 
one instance of intidelity to the Union ? Have the^y withheld 
information or misled our soldiers and officers? What have 
their masters done to earn tlieir o-ratitude ? AVill bleedino; 
backs vote for more blows ? Will hunger ask for less bread ? 
Will they vote for no wages? no homestead? no education ? no 
wife and children ? Who gave them freedom ? The Union. 
Who gave them slavery ? Their masters. If they love freedom 
best they will vote for the Union which gave it to them. What 
think you? Ask the North star how many of these children of 
sorrow have looked at it till tears and day -break blinded them ? 
Do you tell me they are not sufficiently enlightened to be 
trusted with the ballot ? Were they not enough so to be trusted 
with the musket ? Which has given the best evidence of intel- 
lio-ence, the white traitor who knew so little about the Union that 



32 

lie fought against it? or tlie slaves who knew so much about it 
that they fought foi- it? "Which kind of intelligence makes the 
best Union man ? Is a black heart better than a black face? 
Is not he who is good enough to fight for his country, good 
enough to vote for it ? Will you hunt from the ballot box the 
limping black man with the rebel's musket in his hands, and the 
American uniform on him, and giv^e })lace to pardoned treason, 
with blood-dripping fingers, to vote for more trouble? Is this 
democracy? or demonocracy ? republicanism? or an outrage 
upon it? magnanimity? or mean prejudic^e ? gratitude, or ill- 
seasoned spittle in the face of fidelity ? I am sick and tired of 
hearing sensible men say the ex-slaves must not vote in conse- 
quence of their ignorance, and yet approve of pardoning white 
rebels, equally imbruted and ignorant, and restoring them to 
the rights of suffrage. This inconsistency is supremely disgust- 
ing. Xo candid man, acquainted with the complexion of South- 
ern society, will deny that two millions of " poor whites '' exist 
at the South who, in every quality which adorns a worthy citi- 
zen, are inferior to the ex-slaves. Admit them to be equally 
ignorant, the contrast is still great. The poor whites are lazy, 
quarrelsome, vic'ous, profane, boisterous, despisers of labor, and 
generally incapable of either reading or writing. To these 
eminent qualifications they superadd treason. The blacks, on 
the other hand, although they cannot either read or write, in 
consequence of the death-penalty, and not, like the poor whites, 
on account of their natural shiftlessness, are industrious, docile, 
tractable, religious, musical, loyal, and willing to work, Avithout 
revolting at the degradation of labor. The following is an ex- 
tract from the " Journal of a residence on a Southern Planta- 
tion," by Mrs. Fanny Kemble, late of South Carolina. Speak- 
ing of these " poor whites," she sajs : " They are, I suppose, 
the most degraded race of human beings, claiming an Anglo- 
Saxon origin, that can be found on the face of the earth ; filthy, 
lazy, ignorant, brutal, proud, penniless savages, without one of 
the nobler attributes that have been found occasionally allied to 
the vices of savage nature. They own no slaves, for they are, 
almost without exception, abjectly poor ; they will not work, 
for that, as they conceive, w^ould reduce them to an equality to 
the abhorred negroes ; they squat, and steal, and starve on the 
outskirts of this lowest of all civilized societies, and their conn- 



33 

tenances bear witness to the squalor of tlieir condition, and tlie 
utter degradation of tlieir natures." 

Three subdivisions compose the Southern whites ; the old ex- 
slaveholders, never republicans, but always oligarchs, and all of 
whom, worth over twenty thousand dollars, are excluded from 
the executive amnesty ; the middle class, or the yeomanry of the 
South, of which President Johnson and Parson Brownlow are 
gigantic types, and the thrifty mechanics and farmers of the 
North are still more general illustrations and examples. Then 
comes this lowest, subsoil stratum of " poor whites " of whom I 
have spoken. The fact that these degraded, illiterate and dis- 
loyal wrelches are pardoned and restored to the right of suffrage, 
without a word of remonstrance on the ground of their is-iio- 
ranee, while the ex-slaves are not enfranchised, although more 
entitled to be so on the score of their loyalty and better disposi- 
tions, shows conclusively that cruel prejudice, time-grown and 
unreasonable, is the dominant cause. 

This unworthy prejudice every candid and Christian man 
ought to banish from his mind. It indicates a meager degree 
of intelligence and humanity. "What I contend for is equality 
before the law. I think it is very important that every voter 
should be able to read and write. How much better to pre- 
scribe a certain limited amount of education as a qualification 
for the right of suffrage, tlian real estate or a fixed amount 
of property? How it would elevate the nation, and give dig- 
nity to an elector, were all the States, or Congress, under its con- 
stitutional right to be the judge of " the qualifications of its own 
members," to pass a uniform law, requiring a limited educa- 
tional qualification as a prerequisite to the exercise of the elec- 
tive franchise, which the several States might adopt as their own ? 
Were this done I doubt not the freedmen would reach the ballot 
box across this plank sooner than the " poor whites," because 
wath the former liberty is a new and precious boon, and they 
would almost universally qualify themselves at once. What a 
national stride in the career of mental and moral improvement 
this salutary requisition would inaugurate ? But color, creed or 
property should never, at the expense of intelligent manhood, 
disfranchise one class of American citizens and enfranchise an- 
other. In this age of upheaval and reconstruction even-handed 
justice should preponderate over prejudice and political artifices 
to perplex the national tranquillity. Has not God permitted 
3 



34 

tliis war in the interest of tlic black man's fate? "VVe can now 
look back and read in the light of the protracted struggle, and 
the nnmerous earlier disasters and defeats, by which the nation 
was thunderstrnck, roused and terrified, and compelled to learn 
new truths and nnlearn its old, hide-bound fallacies, the fact 
that an educational process was going on to prepare the way for 
universal emancipation. The same discipline is still going on. 
Divine Providence is permitting pardoned rebels to seize tlie 
civil power in the ex-slave States, and to re-inangnrate their pro- 
slavery reign, plantation manners, impudent airs, and pestilent 
heresies, so as to produce a greater disgust and uprising in the 
Nortli than ever, demanding the terror of martial law, enforced 
by the military power, and the right of universal negro suffrage 
and education, to crush forever these diabolical malcontents, 
drive them into the Gulf of Mexico, and into hell-fire, if neces- 
sary to rid the land of such incorrigible and incarnate demons. 
Kegro suffrage will be as popular in the North and West in two 
years as Emancipation now is. He is blind wdio cannot see it. 
I care not what any man believes now. I know full well the 
political faith events will make him confess within two years. 
The law of progress, which is only another name for the almighty 
power which governs the universe, gives every out-grown con- 
dition of humanity sufficient rope to hang itself, and then com- 
pels it to do the wholesome deed with its own hands, and that 
greedily, in consequence of being given over to hardness of 
heart, and blindness of mind, to believe a lie that it may be 
damned. History repeats itself. Read the future by the past. 
God himself has espoused the holy cause of human justice, 
and all the use he now has for unjust men and betrayers of 
the innocent blood is to let them go out like Judas, and 
destroy themselves. "With all time-servers and fossils the day 
of judgment has come. He that sitteth in the heavens shall 
laugh. The Lord shall leave them in derision. Has it not 
been so in the past? What stupendous changes in the na- 
tional sentiment have been wrought ? The good President was 
far ahead of the people. He held high conmiunion with that 
infinite wisdom which sits enthroned on the riches of the uni- 
verse. He tells us he })romised the good angel that went before 
him in the way, if the army was not entirely cut to pieces at 
Antietam, he would issue a Proclamation of Emancipation. It is 
a singular fact that from about that time we had no important de- 



35 

feats. The greatest captain of the civilized world then laid down 
his campaign over a vast continent under the direct inspiration 
of heaven. The order, forward, was given and the tliiinder of 
God began to rock the earth. What victories shook the extrem- 
ities of the land when Grant, the archangel of the war, poured 
out his last vial on Lee's army, and there came a great voice out 
of the temple of heaven and from tlie throne, saying : It is 
done ! Tlie auction blocks fell out from under the captives. 
The bloodhounds lost their scent. The fugitive slave law paused 
in its chase for its weary victim. Liberty, gagged and speech- 
less for thirty years, drew a long breath and shouted : Alleluia ! 
the Lord God omnipotent reigiieth ; his people are free. The 
Dred Scott decision opened its grinders, and the prey was 
plucked from the jaw bone of an ass. 

This, fellow-citizens, is the first 4:th of July, from December 
22, 1620, at which time twenty slaves were landed at James- 
town, Va., from a Dutch vessel, to the present time, a period of 
two hundred and forty-five years, which has w^itnessed our 
beloved America substantially free from domestic slavery. 
ITever before did the day appear so glorious. Xever before did 
the Declaration of Lidependence sound so full and sonorous 
with liberty, nor the Constitution appear so sublime, nor the 
star-spangled banner look so symbolic of glory. 

Liberty, Independence, Union, ISTationalty, Emancipation, a 
vindicated self-government, and a free republic, are words of 
stupendous meaning to the American patriot. They tell us now 
of a country which is truly the land of the free and the home of 
the brave, of consideration and dignity abroad, and of unex- 
ampled prosperity in the future. 

Having now achieved a freedom so beneficent and noble, 
how can we best enjoy and preserve it ? An elevated and 
rational liberty, individually and collectively realized, enjoyed, 
and preserved, rests for security and support upon the Home- 
stead, the Church, the- School-House, the Musket, and the 
Ballot. A fixed home is necessary for the happiness of a civil- 
ized and domestic state. Agriculture is the oldest occupation 
of man. Adam, we are told, in his primitive state of innocence 
and bliss, dressed the garden which his Maker planted for him. 
God declared that amidst budding thorns and thistles he should 
subsist upon " the herb of the field," and in the sweat of his face 
should eat his bread. Mechanic arts and commerce are things 



35 

of later growth. Man must first have food from the gromid 
before he can manufacture iron or build ships. Agriculture, 
more than any other employment, contributes directly to the 
sanitary condition of the body, which is so necessary to a 
healthy and vigorous developmeut of the mind. Other arts 
are useful and important to complement, aggrandize, and supply 
society with the conveniences, comforts, and improvements of 
a highly cultured and civilized life. But while their extrav- 
agant and redundant luxuries can be dispensed with, the nutri- 
tious products of the soil are necessary to human subsistence. 
Every man of suitable age and health should be the father of a 
family. This is man's only normal and happy condition. He 
should own a homestead, however humble, which he can call his 
own ; where he can rear and educate his children in honest 
labor, in frugal habits, in useful knowledge, in liberal reading 
and intelligent conversation, in robust vigor of body and mind, 
in gentle dispositions, cultured tastes, unafiected manners, 
domestic duties, and humanitarian uses ; where he can sow 
flowers, whose beauty and fragrance may send nutrition to the 
soul, whose opening petals are uplifted and longing for the 
everlasting beauty and the eternal perfume ; plant trees and eat 
the luscious fruits thereof; raise the succulent herbs, sweet- 
flavored melons, berries, starchy tubers and sugar-corn ; where, 
in manly independence and dignity, free from anxiety for bread, 
he can equilibrate labor by repose, hunger by the frugal meal, 
the care and trouble of the world by domestic felicity, and give 
to the nation its brightest jewels, sons and daughters to dazzle 
in its crown. If means permit, and a small capital, with good 
judgment, industry, perseverance and time, are ample, he may 
add broader fields for pastures and flocks, plains and valleys 
standing thick with corn, sloping hill-sides blushing with vine- 
yards, with a mansion, vocal witli the music of birds and chil- 
dren, and surrounded by grounds festooned with beauty ; and 
barns filled with plenty, and cattle puffing their muscle on a 
thousand hills. This is the inhabitant that shouteth from the 
top of the rock. When the sons of Columbia shall gird them- 
selves with such giant-souled freedom, the savage and the wolf, 
the serf and the slave, the sophist and the conspirator, poverty 
and rebellion, will curse us no more. 

The church also, with its spii'itual teachings and inspirations, 
true liberty demands. Man's nature is spiritual as well as 



37 

natural. Both are born into embryoiiie states of slavery to ig- 
norance, prejudice, and evil. And botli alike pant to be free. 
The church comes with its open Bible to teach and free the cap- 
tive spirit; with the Old Testament, whose mountain peaks are 
bright with angels and august with the voice of Jehovah ; 
whose chronicles are majestic and instructive in human history, 
divine providence, and the ministrations of angels ; whose 
poetry is heroical, dramatic, lyrical, and devout ; whose proph- 
ecies are utterances of superhuman wisdom ; and whose philos- 
ophy is exampled history ; with the New Testament, whose 
pages gleam wath the warmer love of the infinite Father, 
with the words and the miracles of the Master, the didactic and 
hortatory epistles, and tlie sublimities of the Revelation. She 
comes with the older testament of the out-hano-inof stars, the 
molten looking-glass of Jehovah, their distances, densities, orbits, 
astrology, and brotherhood ; with nature's book of God's power, 
wisdom, goodness, and laws of retribution ; and the inner testa- 
ment of man's complex nature, with exteriors opening outwardly 
and terminating upon the natural world, and interiors opening 
upward to a spiritual world above the spiral stairway, and ter- 
minating on the shining table lands. She teaches a reh'gion of 
justice, and love, and uses ; free from narrow-mindedness, bigotry, 
and intolerance, but vital in charity, warm in zeal, tender in 
sympathy, active in good works, humanitarian and spiritual. 
She breaks a body that is bread indeed, and gives a drink that 
is life immortal. She preaches good tidings to the meek, binds 
up the broken-hearted, proclaims liberty to captives, opens 
prison doors to those who are bound, comforts all who sigh, 
gives them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and 
the garment of praise for the s})irit of heaviness. She gives 
bread to the hungiy, drink to the thirsty, visits the sick, clothes 
the naked, takes in the stranger, and flies to the prisoner. She 
inculcates forgiveness of enemies and brotherhood to all. She 
tells us that the kingdom of heaven is not in creeds and tem- 
ples, but the human soul ; and that the true worshij)ers wor- 
ship the Father not in one particular mountain, nor yet at Jeru- 
salem, but everywhere, only in spirit and in truth. She cheers 
us with an immortal awakening in incorruption, in glory, in 
power, in spiritual bodies. She points us to a temple of the in- 
finite presence and the city which needs no sun nor moon. She 
tells us of gates which shall not be shut at all by day, because no 



38 

night is there ; of a heaven that is to be our home, and an eter- 
nity to be onr life-time ; that the tabernacle of infinite love is to 
be with men, wiping away all tears; and that tliere shall be no 
more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor pain. 

The influence of such a chnrch and such a religion is one of 
the chief corner stones of civil lil)erty. It is a sweet influx 
from celestial spheres, Avliich, like the beams of the sun, is the 
vitalizing and proliflcating power of the mental and moral 
world. As the sweet influences of Pleiades beat back the 
winter-king and fecundate the spring with bursting beauty, so 
these benign teachings and inspirations are the life and light of 
men, quickening their souls and leading thorn to the knowledge 
and freedom of truth. All the great inspirational geniuses, 
reformers, lawgivers, and saviours of the world are examples of 
its power. The most refined and cultured nations of the earth 
illustrate its civih'zing tendency. True liberty marches to the 
music of religion. It is this that is to rise, like the sun in his 
clear shining, above the cloud-land of superstition, bigotry, and 
sect, and })romote a grander social and s])iritual integralism, the 
fraternization and unification of all, by the justification of all, 
which is the taking away of the sins of the world. It is restora- 
tive of the unity of the race from polar antagonisms, by substi- 
tuting a composite, artistic, and spiritual unity, which respects, 
preserves, and cherishes all organic and normal difterences, 
infinite variety in unity like the universe, based on the scientific 
distribution of harmonious notes, and the oneness of truth, wis- 
dom, goodness, justice, faith, hope, and charity, instead of aeon- 
strained unity, grounded in antagonistic creeds. This recon- 
structed and spiritual unity of the race is the grand restitution 
of all things which the prophets have foretold since the world 
began. 

The school-house is another corner stone of civil liberty. 
Civil liberty is natural liberty regulated by ])ublic law. Civil 
laws, springing from social needs, rest for support upon the in- 
telligence of the peo])le. They are the objective manifestation 
of a nation's subjective life. Tell me the number of school-, 
houses in a State, and I will tell von, other things being equal, 
the character of the people, the quality of their laws, and their 
relative degrees of refinement, morality, and soul culture. Noth- 
ing arrests the attention of the intelligent and observing traveler, 
through the States of this Union, more marvelously than the 



39 

number of neat, comfortable, and well-filled school-houses in the 
North, and the almost total absence of them in the South. 
Chiefly from this cause have sprung two diverse civilizations. 
One is based on public intelligence, and the other on popular 
ignorance. The sturdy, out-cropping growths of the one are an 
austere morality ; public and private virtue ; comj)arative rare- 
ness of poverty and crime; generally distributed wealth; do- 
mestic tranquillity ; the dignity and honor of labor ; social 
equality; generaL intelligence; hygienic, physiological, and 
humane civil laws ; hospitality and large-hearted benevolence; 
potentialized industry, agricultural, mechanical, and clieniical, 
applied to progressive and wealth-producing purposes ; inven- 
tions, discoveries, arts and sciences, radiating blandness, grace- 
fulness, beauty, charms, and uses ; great tliinkei'S, philanthro- 
pists, and reformers ; literary and artistic geniuses, and organ- 
izing minds ; chiefs of industry, commerce, and finance ; 
aspiring humanitarian and religious natures ; the elevation of 
woman from degradation to a victor in the field of thought, art, 
and science ; of domestic felicity, divine intuition, devotion, love, 
beauty, and sentiment translated into daily life ; all culminating 
in munificent power of accomplishment, grandeur of soul, and 
infinitely diversified and luxurious gratifications, in true subor- 
dination and hai'mony with the advent of a grand, millennial 
age, and a reconstructed heraldry, grounded only in merit. 

Is it any marvel, therefore, why such a people loved a Gov- 
ernment, a Union, a Nationality, a Country, and a Flag, under 
whose beneficent protection they had risen to such heights of 
progress, happiness, and power ? Does it surprise you that tiiey 
poured out so freely their blood and treasure dui-ing these weary 
years to defend and preserve them ? Contrast the ignorance, 
shiftlessness, hatred of labor, mental imbecility, viciousncss, cru- 
elty, lewdness, profanity, and boisterous outbursts of passion, 
and the low estimate of the Union of the " poor whites " of the 
South, with the opposite characteristics of the same relative grade 
of society in the Korth, and you will have a full demonstration 
of what the school-house has done for the North and tlie want 
of it for the South. The rifle is only needed to defend liberty 
against semi-barbarians and savages. Who thinks of its use for 
this purpose in the North ? The Puritans were obliged to stack 
their arms around their temples to protect themselves from the 
Indians while they worshiped God within. For the same pur- 



40 

pose the peaceful and enlightened North has been compelled to 
use its muskets against sonthern savages and traitors. For sim- 
ilar reasons the freedmen may yet find the same death-dealing 
arm against their implacable foes the only salutary method of 
securing and defending their liberties. Under a republican form 
of government the elective franchise is an indispensable prerog- 
ative of freemen. Only Monarchies and Oligarchies berate and 
despise it. Without it Eepubli(?s decay and perish. From these 
considerations we hold that the homestead, the church, the 
school-house, the rifle, and the ballot are essential to the securi- 
ty and enjoyment of civil liberty ; and that this standpoint is 
one which no assaulting colunms, with gleaming rhetoric or sharp 
shooting logic, can either caj)ture or flank. The ultimate dispen- 
sation of these blessings to four millions of ex-slaves, and to an 
equal number of " poor whites," is one of the grandest results of 
the war, and the snblimest triumphs of modern civilization. A 
reasonable expectation now exists that, in process of time, the 
howling wilderness of southern ignorance, superstition, vice, and 
popular delusions will bud and blossom as the rose. 

We rejoice, then, fellow citizens, on this birth-day of Amer- 
ican Independence, with a Jiew and double joy. We not only 
invoke the recollections of the old republic, with its thrilling 
revolutionary times, and inspiring themes, but we celebi'ate vic- 
tories which herald the advent of the white-winged angel of 
peace to our bereaved America, with new Liberties, a stronger 
Union, a grander Nationality^, a more august and respected Ban- 
ner, a vindicated Constitution, the rights of self-government, ter- 
ror to tyrants, and a refulgent future. 

Sweet, blessed Peace ! we hail thee with canticles of joy and 
gratitude to God : for thou hast brought us back the land of 
Columbus as free as when he first discovered it, and the old war- 
worn flag, covered with glory, beneath whoso starry folds no 
slave shall ever clank his chains. Thou hast come with tro- 
phies : the subjugation of r.bols, the surrender of armies, the 
opening of prison doors to starving soldiers, the reign of terror 
ended, and the rebellion crushed. Thou hast silenced the mar- 
tial trumpet, taken ofl['the clothing of thunder from the neck of 
the war horse, stacked the empty arms of the nation, sheathed 
the sword, unfixed the bayonet, laid up the iron dads, and dis- 
banded our veteran legions. Thou hast brought us freedom 
from ghastly war, stormy passions, raids, piracies, starvatior. 



41 

incendiarism, the virus of yellow fever, tramping armies, fear, 
terror, and further loss of blood and treasure. On thy glad 
wings are borne quietness of mind, tranquillity, harmony, con- 
cord, reconciliation, oaths of allegiance, amnesty, security, good 
conscience, freedom, progress, reconstruction, and national re- 
generation. We love thee for thy sweet spirit, and thy good 
tidings, and thou art an angel more beautiful and welcome to us 
to-day than ever. What precioub healing is in thy snowy wings? 
How loaded down Avith treasures that outsparkle the solar crim- 
son ? With the olive branch evermore in thy mouth, from ocean 
to ocean, stretch over this broad-breasted and united land the 
silvery whiteness of thy bosom, and brood over our n^sutual for- 
giveness, reunion, prosperity, and glory. O, fellow citizens, what 
signities the joy of America to day ? What mean these roaring 
cannon? chiming bells? long processions ? cloven tongues ? py- 
rotechnic displays ? streaming banners ? and tumultuous jubila- 
tio)is of thirty five millions, causing the earth and the air to vi- 
brate with a nation's hosannas ? It is because the nation cele- 
brates its independence re-proclaimed, re-assured, and forever 
vindicated by victories undimmed in splendor, guaranteeing 
greater liberties and firmer peace. It is because the confused 
noise and garments rolled in blood, which have converted a land 
of treason into a slaughter house, are now exchanged for the si- 
lence of peace and the robes of salvation. It is because our ma- 
ternal sorrows are well nigh foi'gotten in the joy that a man- 
child is born unto us. 

All new life is heralded into being by pain and anguish. 
For four years the continent has been reeling and staggering, 
like a drunken man, with the throes of a terrible earthquake. 
The face of all nature has been changed. Huge mountains 
have been uplifted into the air ; yawning caverns opened for 
oceans and seas ; channels dug out for the rivers ; towns and 
cities submerged beneath molten fire; and solemn volcanoes ac- 
tive with flames and lava. The timid, superstitious, and igno- 
rant have been greatly alarmed, and have cried : Peace at any 
price. But the terror and tumult have passed away and divine 
wonders are seen. It now appears that beneficent marvels have 
taken place, divine uses been performed, stupendous problems 
solved, and new conditions crystallized. Two forces have been 
wrestling with each other ; fii'o and water, with vapor and in- 
candescent gases, have been rending and demolishing old con- 



42 

ditions. A subtciTaiiean cliemistiT. with crucibles, alembics, fire 
and acids, has been at work, far down in the solemn and secret 
places where tlie vulture's eve has never peered, and the lion's 
"whelp has never trodden, retiniiig, transmuting, subliming, and 
upheaving to the surface, for future use, treasures whose vakie 
no arithmetic can calculate. We now see the mystic footprints 
of Jeliovali walkinac on the rocks ; the stupendous and outcrop- 
ping layers of wealth stratified one above the other; the beau- 
tiful cry&tals and salts from seething furnaces; the metalliferous 
ores ; the fused products of the crucible refrigerated and crys- 
tallized ; sparkling diamonds from carbon ; soft marking slates 
from clays ; blue-teined and white gleaming marble from lime- 
stone, breathing in statuary ; gray and flesh-red granite from 
quartz, feldspar, and mica for solid foundations ; variegated 
sandstones, of loose and close textures, for palaces and temples ; 
measures of coal and fossil fuel for domestic comfort, dancing 
spindles, and thundering engiues ; rivers of oil pouring from the 
rocks and bursting from wells, for light and lubrication ; 
iron, lead, and copper for agricultural, mechanical, and chemical 
uses ; with mountain vaults of virgin silver and gold, to liqui- 
date the debts of freedom and mock the treasuries of the old 
world, stored away in safety where moth and rust do not cor- 
mpt, and where thieves do not break through and steal. 

Solid things, precious things, divine tilings lie gleaming and 
crystallized about us. All classes now begin to see them and 
acknowledge their value, and with shamefacedness confess they 
were more frightened than hurt. These new exigencies have 
thro%vn up for admiration the old Constitution, and proved it 
equal to the ghastly times. Who ever knew it had such a 
plucky gripe for treason? We had lived under it in times of 
peace and found it a very mild, compromising, and pacific instru- 
ment. But who dreamed it contained such despotism to crush 
the conspirator and save liberty ? such omnipresence to hunt 
and spy? such omnipot'ence to aiTest, try, imprison, exile, 
release, execute ? such power to suspend the Writ of Habeas 
Corpus in order to suspend the corpus ? such magic to make the 
mountains give up their oaks for keels and ribs of death-dealing 
victors of the deep ? to disembowel the hills of their ferruginous 
ore to flank their sides with grinning coats of mail ? to cast such 
swamp angels, from whose blazing throats shot and shell should 
leap with the speed of the lightning and the scream of the 



43 

eagle ? to create such a navy and muster such an army, terrible 
with banners? to organize war? to load and fire? to create a 
national paper cuiTency so long needed, and turn rags into 
greenbacks like snow-flakes and dew-drops? to wrestle with 
thrones ? square accounts with nations ? shake its list at Napo- 
leon? gnash on Maximilian? and grin at spavined aristocracy? 
to stand the strain of a Presidential election in time of war and 
the terror of assassination? to raise money ? collect taxes ? and 
confiscate the property of traitors ? to blockade harbors ? chase 
pirates ? free four millions of slaves ? burn bridges? tear up rail- 
roads? and forage and quarter on the enem_y ? to fight battles ? 
make sieges? fordrivers? bridgeswamps? outmarch bloodhounds? 
capture armies? and feed an almshouse of whipped rebels? to 
grant amnesties ? punish treason ? issue proclamations? reconstruct 
States? and adapt itself to every new emergency like the trunk 
of an elephant which can rive an oak or pick up a pin? Yet it 
did all tliese things, not arbitraiily, but constitutionally. 

A glorious and sublime feature of our civilization has also 
made its appearance and illustrated the beautiful character of 
our American womanhood. England had but one Florence 
Nightingale in the Crimean war. But America has had her 
entire womanhood, her Seraphim and Cherubim of angels, stand- 
ino- at the altar dav and nig-ht, with o;olden censers and much 
incense. For four weary years have they stood heroically upon 
this terrible sea of glass, mhigled with fire, having gotten the 
victory over the beast and over his image, and over his mark, 
and over the number of his name. Mothers, sisters, wives, 
and daughters first gave their sons, brothers, husbands, and 
fathers to fight the battles of freedom ; and then gave them their 
sympathies, prayers, ministrations and contributions of food and 
clothing. Who ever knew before the intimate and valuable 
connection between hearthstones and campfires ? needles and bay- 
onets ? lint and wounds ? nurses and hospitals ? packages and pris- 
ons? Who ever knew before that women could fight with ban- 
dages ? and needles ? and slippers ? and cold water ? and dainties ? 
and sympathies ? Who ever dreamed, when our heroic soldiers 
nerved their patriotism to such a height as to leave their homes 
for their country's defense, that American mothers, wives, sisters, 
and daughters would carry their homes to them, and bring back 
the hearts of their fathers, husbands, brothers, and sons to their 



44 

lomes? Tills vast army of American women, with sympathies 
and blessings outspreading like the wings of angels over a vast 
continent, has done much to comfort and preserve the army and 
navy unto the final consummation of victory. Is it any wonder 
that the nation is saved ? 

The war has yielded to the whole people instructive experi- 
ence. We have learned and unlearned more in four years than 
in the preceding fifty. What a change has been wrought in 
public sentiment since Baltimore fired on the Massachusetts 
soldiers? Who now believes slavery to be a divine institution 
except the last Legislature of New Jersey? What a pestilent 
interpretation of the Constitution has been choked down ? The 
position of each State, in reference to the whole, has been for- 
ever defined and established. ISTullification of federal and con- 
stitutional law by States has been shown to be incompatible 
with the Union, repugnant to the Constitution, contradicted by 
its spirit, and opposed to every principle on which it was found- 
ed, and for which it was formed. The theory of State Rights, 
as held by the conspirators, has been signally defeated by force 
of arms. This fruitful source of agitation, alienation and dis- 
loyalty from the first days of the Republic, has been forever 
removed from the land, and the world stands instructed. For- 
eign nations now understand that we are not a number of weak 
States like ancient Greece, Central and South America, but a 
Nation. Tlie sword and its terrible doings have decided that 
the Constitution of the United States forms a Government^ not 
a league ; a more perfect Union^ not a confederation ; a unified 
and indissoluble Power, not a friendly alliance. We now see 
that the same power which formed the United States formed 
also the States. In both cases it was the people and not the 
States, To the United States the Avhole people granted supreme 
and sovereign power, and to the several States respective por- 
tions of the same people, in petitionary constitutions, granted cer- 
tain subordinate powers which the United States, in the exercise 
of its absolute sovereignty, sanctioned. Over these limited and 
subordinate rights the States are sovereign. Over their supreme 
and overshadowing functions the United States are sovereign. 
The whole people, for the common good, reserved to the United 
States powers enough to form a Nation. Among their major 



45 

rights the Constitution ennraerates these : the right to lay and 
collect taxes, duties, imports, and excises, to .pay the debts and 
provide for the common defense and general welfare of the 
United States ; to borrow money on the credit of the United 
States; to regulate commerce with foreign nations, among the 
several States, and with the Indians ; to establish a uniform rule 
of naturalization andunifoi-m laws on the subject of bankruptcies 
throughout the United States ; to guarantee to every State in 
the Union a republican form of government, and protect each 
of them agni; st invasion ; to declare the punishment of treason ; 
to make and alter regulations concerning the times and manner 
of electing members of Congress; to coin money and regulate 
the value thereof, and of foreign coins, and fix the standard of 
weights and measures ; to provide for the punishment of coun- 
terfeiting ; to establish post offices and post roads ; to promote 
the progress of science and useful arts by securing to authors 
and inventors copy rights and patents ; to constitute tribunals 
inferior to the Supreme Court ; to define and punish piracies 
and felonies and ofienses against the laws of nations ; to declare 
war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules con- 
cerning captures on land and water ; to raise and support 
armies ; to provide and maintain a navy ; to make rules for the 
government and regulation of the land and naval forces ; to 
provide for the calling forth the militia to execute the laws of 
the Union, suppress insurrection and repel invasions ; to pro- 
vide for organizing, arming and disciplining the militia ; to 
exercise exclusive legislation over the District of Columbia; to 
exercise authority over all places for the erection of forts, maga- 
zines, arsenals, dockyards and other needful buildings, and to 
make all laws which shall be necessary and pi-oper for carrying 
into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested 
in til e United States. 

Whatever laws Congress may from time to time deem it 
necessary to enact to carry out all the above grants of sovereign 
power, are declared in the Sixth Article of the Constitution to 

be "the Supreme Law of the land anything in the 

constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstand- 
ing." Are not these rights and powers enough to constitute a 
Nation ? Not one of them can a single State exercise. With- 
out the right to discharge these functions, how much sovereignty 
would a State possess? Divested of such powers self-govern- 



46 

ment could not exist. Tlie people, in tlieir wisdom, witliheld 
these powers from the States and gave them absolutely and 
exclusively to the United States to be administered by the 
national sovereignty over the whole land to establish justice, 
insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, 
promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty. 
To say, tiierefore, a State can secede is to say the United States 
arc not a Nation. It is to say a finger may secede from the hand, 
or the hand from the arm, or the arm from the body. What 
could the members do without the body? How could they live 
and pei'form uses ? Would not the body also have a right to 
cry out, in its absolute sovereignty, against such pain, deformity, 
and loss of its members? Through the terrible arbitrament of 
war the absurd teachings of Southern sophists, wdio desired to 
escape with their barbarous institutions from a republican form 
of government, have been rejected with disapprobation and 
contempt. In their stead the doctrine of a sovereign Nation- 
ality^ with a spinal colunm sturdy enough to support the whole 
body, and furnish vital marrow to every member, is now 
acknowledged and vociferated through the land. The proud 
title of American citizen now means honor and securit}^ both at 
home and abroad. Wherever the banner goes all the stars go 
with it, and land sufficient still remains unorganized to put 
enough more into its blazing blue to make it the milky way of 
the political heavens, to which all nations may look for liberty 
bursting in its beams, and beneath which unborn millions, in 
equality, fraternity, and security, may find justice and repose. 
The national sovereignty, therefore, which we eulogize and 
celebrate to-day, uplifted above dissensions and weakness, con- 
stitutes the grand plank in the platform of our peace, whose 
soundness shall never decay. 

The cost of these blessings to ourselves and our jiosterity, 
though great in treasure and in blood, is insignificant in com- 
parison with their value. Still, our joy to-day is not unmingled 
with sorrow at the absence of the honored dead. Ileroical men : 
your names, your deeds and your memories will never perish ; 
you liave died that liberty might live ; you bravely fell at the 
post of duty and honor tliat your country might have eternal 
renown. A restored Union, a triumphant banner, a solid joeace, 
and a grateful nation, drop tears upon your ashes and gather 
wreaths for your immortal brows. Whenever America calls 



47 

over her roll of honor a sci-geant shall step out of the ruiiks and 
answer to your names. Wherever freedom eomits ijp the 
triumphs and the gains of this ghastly war, fond recollection 
shall revive the memory of your patriotism and valor. 

"Death loves a shilling marlc, a sij;;nal l>lo\v, 
A blow which while it executes alarms, 
And startles thousands by a single fall." 

AVhere is he who led ns through the deep that we should not 
stumble, and with his glorious arni, brought ns up out of the 
sea, and hath made himself an everlasting name? How beauti- 
ful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good 
tidings, that publisheth peace ! Martyred President ! supreme 
citizen of the nation ! duty incarnate ! foul assassination, personi- 
fying the spii'it of the rebellion, struck thee down in the hour of 
thy glory and thy triumph ! The long, bright pencil of thy 
earthly life is beautiful with the deeds, the memories, and the 
mercy of the just. Sweet liberty places on thy brows the 
martyr's crown, and all her temples eternize thy fame. Uplifted 
to the beatitudes of the good, above the cares and the honors of 
state, how ecstatic must be thy joy over the jubilee of redemp- 
tion thou hast given to four millions of slaves! The spirit o^f 
the Lord God was upon thee ; because the Lord anointed thee 
to preach good tidings unto the meek, and sent thee to bind up 
the broken hearted ; to proclaim libert}' to the captives, and the 
opening of the prison to them who were bound ; to proclaim 
the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of 
our God ; to comfort all that mourned ; to give unto them 
beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment 
of praise for the spirit of heaviness, that they might be called 
trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might 
be glorified. And they shall build the old wastes, and raise up 
the former desolations, and repair the waste cities. Thou hast 
merited the benedictions and the rewards of the faithful : for 
when the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy 
angels with him, then shall the King say unto thee : Come thou 
blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared fur thee 
from the foundation of the world : for I was an hungered and thou 
gavest me meat : I was thirsty and thou gavest me drink : I was 
a stranger and thou didst take me in : naked and thou didst 
clothe me : I was sick and thou didst visit me : I was in prison 



48 

and thou earnest unto me : for verily I say unto thee : Inasmuch 
as thou hast done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, 
thou hast done it unto me. 

Melancholy indeed is the contrast between the character and 
end of this illustrious patriot and philanthropist and those of 
Jefi'erson Davis. Educated at AYest Point, at the expense of 
the nation, and bound by his oath to preserve, protect and de- 
fend the Constitution of the United States, both lionor and ob- 
ligation challenged his fealty to the Union. Of commanding 
presence, tall stature, spare form, stooping carriage, inflexible 
■will, austere morals, imperial disposition, dauntless courage, 
clear intellect, bold in political chicanery, a repudiator of public 
and private faith, a subtle sophist, an audacious conspirator, 
revengeful towards his enemies, ambitious of power, honor, 
office, emoluments, and glory, he was fitted by nature and edu- 
cation to overawe inferior minds, and mold them to his will. 
Surrounded by sycophants, infatuated by a sense of personal 
destiny, and allured by dreams of illustrious distinction as the 
champion of an aristocratic empire, based on slave labor, both 
white and black, he renounced his country and his flag, broke 
his solemn oath, and enlisted in a causeless rebellion against 
republican institutions. He sought at flrst by treacherous stealth 
and official corruption, to arm and march his treason against the 
old Union and overcome it before suspicions were awakened, or 
resistance could be equipped. Defeated in this, he organized 
the most merciless and barbarous engines of war against his 
betrayed and bleeding country : cruelty, treachery, fire, pesti- 
lence, starvation and assassination. But exhausted, at length, 
in money, men, credit, confidence and honor, he fled in guilt 
and terror before the sublime pomp of the old banner. Ignobly 
captured in unmanly disguise, he now lies a prisoner in the 
hands of the Government, awaiting the just reward of his crimes. 
A sublime spectacle of melancholy misanthropy and haggard 
fate, his forlorn condition enlists both pity and execration. 
What mischief has this bad man wrought? "Wliat dark, tor- 
menting thoughts must occupy and discompose his soul ? What 
stinging compunctions and recoiling memories must goad and 
lacerate his spirit? What terrible pictures of his desolations, 
slaughters, and woe must ever be present to his vivid imagina- 
tion ? What ghostly spectres of the dead nnist haunt him by 
day, and grin at him by night, and say: we are here on your 



49 

account ! To aggravate and prolong his mental anguish, and 
make his retribution ever present and intolerable, he can neithei- 
fly from himself nor his reflections. The words which Milton 
puts into the mouth of his infernal fiend best describe the nature 
of his wild unrest : 

" Me miserable ! which way shall I fly 
Iiifiaite wrath and infinite despair ? 
Which way I fly is hell, myself am hell, 
And in the lowest depths, a lower deep 
Still threatening to devour me, opens wide. 
To which the hell I suffer seems a heaven." 

To the gallant soldiers and sailors whose patriotism and cour- 
age have preserved the sacred memories and increased the glory 
of this day, we address words of congratulation and welcome. 
In the dark hour of your country's peril, when Liberty, throttled 
by treason, uttered her rallying cry, you sprung to arms to halt 
the march of the oppressor, resist his insolence, preserve the 
Union, and vindicate free government to man. With patriotic 
pride and sublime hope we have seen, from year to year and from 
field to field, your victorious legions advance against a heroical 
and brutal foe. And now, with the same old flag of our fathers, 
still flaming with all its stars, and with shields gleaming with 
the s^^lendor of victory, you have mercifully returned from Fort 
Sumter, Vicksbm-g, Kew Orleans, Lookout Mountain, Gettys- 
burgh, Atlanta, Savannah, Charleston, the Wilderness, the 
Shenandoah Valley, Petersburg, Fort Fisher, Richmond, and the 
foul dens of Libby Prison, Andersonville and Salisbury. You have 
fought climate, hunger, thirst, stormy night, the wet earth, the 
chilly death-damp, pestilence, treacherous pickets, ambush, rifle- 
pits, masked batteries, deadly swamps, bridgeless rivei"S, perfidious 
forests, breast works, barbarity, tomahawk, torpedo, strategy, 
dungeons, starvation, pitched battles, veteran troops, gory shot 
and sliell, fixed bayonets, sharpshooting musketry, and deadly 
artillery. The world's military achievements are forever dimmed 
by the distances and rapidity of your marches, the duration of 
your sieges, the resolution aud obstinacy of your battles, the 
pluck of your charges, the number and variety of your conflicts, 
the brilliancy of your victories, and the lustre of their results. By 
bringing home the glorious old banner, war-worn, yet victorious, 
with lasting peace inscribed on its folds, and the Union forever 
preserved, you have sent forth the beckoning angel of Liberty, 
4 



50 

with healing in his wings, to all the down-trodden nations of 
the earth. Your bronzed faces, honorable scars, and empty 
sleeves, attest the heroism of your deeds, and to-day the national 
airs are putting them to music. With honest pride and satis- 
faction we welcome you back to the peaceful and honorable pur- 
suits of agriculture, commerce, manufactures, arts, sciences, and 
industrial achievements. A grateful country votes you to-day 
its glorious freedom, and you shall hereafter write your own 
passes and furloughs. American nationality and prosperity, in 
all time to come, will proudly point you out as the soldiers of 
the Union. The bright pages of history will forever brighten 
and sparkle with the marvels of your gallantry. Painting, 
sculpture, poetry and music shall celebrate your patriotism and 
prolong the just meed of your praise. The laurel and the myr- 
tle shall never wither upon your brows, the freshness of your 
memories shall never decay, and imperishable, as the mountain 
home of our liberties, shall be the record of your fame. 

Fellow-citizens, what an age is this ! It is one that many 
prophets and righteous men have desired to see and have not 
seen. The candle of the Lord shall shine upon its illustrious 
head, and in the light thereof it shall walk through all dark- 
ness. The secret of God shall be upon its tabernacle; the 
Almighty shall still be with it, and all its children shall be 
about it. It shall wash its steps with butter and the rocks 
shall pour it out rivers of oil. It shall go out to the gate 
through the city, and prepare its seat in the street. The 
young men who shall see it shall hide themselves in awe, 
and the aged shall rise and stand up. Princes shall refrain 
from talking, and lay their hands on their moutlis. ISToblos shall 
hold their peace, and their tongues shall cleave to the roof of 
their mouths. The ear that hears it shall bless it, and the eye 
that sees it shall give witness to it : because it hath delivered 
the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none 
to help him. The Ijlessing of him that was ready to perish 
shall come upon it, and it shall cause the widow's lieart to leap 
for joy. Its raiment shall be righteousness and justice its 
robe and diadem. It shall be eyes to all the nations which are 
blind, and feet to the lame, and a father to the poor, and the 
cause which it knows not it shall righteously search out. It shall 
break the jaws of the wicked, open their imperial grinders, and 
[)luck the spoil out of tlieir teeth. Like the aged palm it shall 



51 

multiply its days and prolong its vigor and majesty. Its thrifty 
root shall spread out by the waters, and the dew shall lay all 
night upon its branches. Its glory shall be crowned with peren- 
nial freshness, and its bow shall be renewed in its hand. Unto 
it shall all men and all nations give ear, and keep silent at its 
counsel. Its speech shall drop upon them, and after its words 
of wisdom they shall not speak again. The down-trodden people 
will wait for it as for the rain, and open their mouths wide as 
for the latter rain. "What it ridicules they will disbelieve, and 
the light of its countenance they will never cast down. It shall 
choose out their way in darkness, and sit above them as chief, 
and dwell forever as a king in the army, and as one that com- 
forteth the mourners. 

" Like some tall cliff it lifts its awful form, 

Swells from the vale and midway cleaves the storm ; 
Though round its breast some transient clouds are spread, 
Eternal sunshine settles on its head." 

But, fellow citizens, this has all been the work of God. Man 
alone never could have achieved these wonders. Who cannot 
look back and see the hand of God in the antecedents, the com- 
mencement, the progress, the termination, and the results of this 
war ? And he who shall prove himself to be the real father of 
American history will comprehend this, and make his pages 
gleam and burn with the divine manifestations. The mountains 
have been full of invisible horsemen and chariots of fire. The 
Lord has been our rock, our fortress, and our deliverer ; our 
shield, and the horn of our salvation, our high tower, our refuge, 
and our Saviour. Wlien the waves of death compassed us, the 
floods of ungodly men made us afraid, the sorrows of hell besieg- 
ed us, and the snares of death went before us, in our distress 
we cried unto God, and he did hear our voice out of his temple. 
Then the earth shook and trembled ; the foundations of heaven 
moved and vibrated, because he was wroth. A smoke went up 
out of his nostrils, and devouring fire out of his mouth, kindled 
coals. He bowed the heavens and came down, and darkness 
was under his feet. He rode upon a cherub and did fly, and he 
was seen upon the wings of the wind. He made darkness pa- 
vilions round about him, dark waters, and thick clouds of the 
skies. The brightness which went before him kindled coals of 
fire. He thundered from heaven, and marvelously uttered his 



52 

voice. When we were walling to do justice, the Lord rewarded 
us according to our righteousness, and recompensed us according 
to the cleanness of our hands. lie taught our hands to war, so 
that bows of steel have been broken bj our arms. The Lord 
girded us for the battle and subdued those beneath us w^ho rose up 
against us. He hath given us the neck of our enem'ies. They 
looked, but there was none to save ; even imto the Lord, but he 
answered them not. Then we beat them as small as the dust of 
the earth ; we stamped them as the mire of the street ; we dis- 
banded and spread them abroad. Strangers shall submit 
themselves unto us, and, as soon as they shall hear, shall be 
obedient to our voice : for they shall fade aw^ay in their 
greatness, and be afraid in their haughty places. The Lord 
liveth ; and blessed be the rock of our salvation. It is he that 
avengeth us, and bringeth down the unruly people under us ; 
that hath brought us forth triumphant over our foes, and lifted 
us up to high places, and delivered us from the violent man. 

Therefore let us say with Moses : I will sing unto the Lord, for 
he hath triumphed gloriously ; the horse and his rider hath he 
thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and song, and he 
is become my salvation ; he is my God, and I will prepare him 
a habitation ; my father's God, and I will exalt him. The Lord 
is a man of war; the Lord is his name. Pharaoh's chariots and 
his host hath he cast into the sea ; his chosen captains also 
are drowned in the Red Sea. The depths have covered them ; 
they sank into the bottom as a stone. The enemy said : I w'ill 
pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil ; my lust shall 
be satished upon them ; I will draw my sw-ord, my hand shall 
■destroy them. Thou didst blow with thy wnnd, the sea covered 
them ; they sank' as lead in the mighty waters. Who is like 
thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in ])raises, doing wonders. 
Thou, in thy mercy, hast led forth the people whom thou hast 
redeemed ; thou hast guided them in thy strength unto thy holy 
habitation. Fear and dread sliall fall upon the dukes of Edom, 
and the jnighty nuni of Moab ; by the greatness of thine arm they 
shall be as still as a stone ; till thy i)eoplc pass over, O Lord, Avhom 
thou hast delivered. Thou shalt bring them in and plant them 
in the mountain of thine inheritance, which thou liast made for 
thee to dwell in : in the sanctuary which thy hands have estab- 
lished. The Lord shall reimi forever and ever. 



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